


Secrets and Lies

by LottieHolmes



Series: Kaitou Kid vs. the Black Organisation [2]
Category: Magic Kaitou, 名探偵コナン | Detective Conan | Case Closed
Genre: F/M, Romance, Secret Identity
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-07-27
Updated: 2016-05-05
Packaged: 2017-12-21 12:39:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 18
Words: 39,608
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/900420
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LottieHolmes/pseuds/LottieHolmes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sequel to Midnight Meeting. After the events at Tokyo Tower and the destruction the Pandora, Hakuba knows that he, Aoko and Kaito aren't safe anymore and the Black Organisation has to be destroyed. Their only leads are APTX 4869 and Sherry.<br/>To find out more they team up with Conan Edogawa to bring the Black Organisation down.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Conan Edogawa

**Author's Note:**

> To understand this fanfiction it would help to read "Midnight Meeting" as this is the sequel. However you don't have to.

Secrets and lies: Chapter 1

That night Hakuba found himself unable to sleep. His mind kept whirring away deducting and worrying. When this criminal organisation found out what happened at Tokyo Tower they would investigate and found out about Aoko and his involvement they were bound to thoroughly examine the statements that had given to the police about a criminal gang taking Aoko hostage and shooting at Kid. He wouldn't be safe anymore and neither was Aoko.

He felt responsible for Aoko as she was his classmate and he worked alongside her father who had made him promise to keep her safe anyway. He quite liked Kaito Kuroba now that he had finally confessed about being Kaito Kid and he obviously wasn't doing his night job for profit of any kind. Judging by the way that the mysterious organisation had found out that Aoko had a romantic relationship with Kaitou Kid they must have an efficient intelligence service so his movements would have to be careful from now on.

He sighed and rolled over in his bed and closed his eyes. He would think about it in the morning when he saw Kaito and Aoko to discuss what they were going to do. Hakuba wished he had bought his hawk Watson with him to Japan as he wouldn't have minded someone to talk to. His father was never at home and they didn't talk much anyway.

Chikage Kuroba closed the door behind a red-eyed Hakuba and smiled at him knowingly.

"They're in the front room," she informed him, pointing.

Hakuba thanked her and looked at his pocket watch. It was 1 minute and 0.012 seconds after 11 o'clock in the morning. He had arranged to meet Kaito and Aoko at Kaito's house sometime in the morning. He had guessed deduced that Kaito wasn't the type of person that got up early in the morning so he had estimated that at 11 o'clock he should be sufficiently awake to plan. He heard Kaito's mother footsteps return to another room on the other side of the house and judged that she wasn't the type of person to listen in.

He entered the room that she had pointed out and found Kaito and Aoko curled up on the sofa next to each other. They were both reading different Arsène Lupin novels which didn't surprise him one bit. On the wall there was a lifesize portrait of Toichi Kuroba. He absorbed all the details of their appearances and clothing and came to an immediate conclusion about what they had been doing.

"Holmes is superior to Lupin," was Hakuba's only comment as he sat down in the armchair opposite with his posture perfectly straight. "Aoko-san by any chance did you spend the night here?"

"H-how did you know that?" spluttered a very red-faced Aoko. "My father said that since my address was known I had better stay somewhere else and he called up Kaito's Mum."

Hakuba decided to keep it brief and not go into detail about everything that he could deduce about what happened the previous night between the two. "Your hair is wet and you are close to the end of the book you are reading. So you've clearly been here for a while and you are wearing the same skirt you were wearing yesterday, but you are wearing one of Kuroba's shirts. It's obvious."

"Very well deduced Holmes," Kaito congratulated sarcastically making sure he had his poker face on to hide his embarrassment at getting caught out. "We're over 16. Can we get to the important business please?"

"Snake's body disappeared on the way to the mortuary; the driver was drugged and replaced. All the members that were captured committed suicide by using a poison capsule concealed in their mouth whilst in police custody. So we can't get any leads from them."

Kaito nodded. "That makes sense. They haven't got where they are by making careless mistakes. They're careful so we have to be even more careful."

"Does that mean that we are all in danger?" Aoko asked worriedly.

Hakuba and Kaito exchanged looks. Hakuba made a hand gesture to Kaito indicate that they shouldn't tell her everything so she wouldn't have to worry too much about her safety. Kaito shook his head at him to indicate the opposite. He knew Aoko wouldn't want a softened version; she would demand the whole truth with a mop for a weapon if it came to that.

"Aoko," he said taking her hand. "You might have to stay with me for a while. It's dangerous for you to be in your house alone. I'll look after you and so will my mother. It's to protect you and your father."

Hakuba broke in, "I can't really find a believable pretext for you to have Police guards without having to explain everything to the Police. The current story was that all the members were at Tokyo Tower last night."

"That's the trouble with lying, you have to make sacrifices with the truth. I think to minimise risks we have to get in contact with Conan Edogawa as soon as possible without leading Them to him."

"Yes, we should take trip to Beika, loose any tails we have and pay a visit to the Mouri Detective Agency."

"I'm coming," Aoko volunteered interrupting the conversation, knowing that she would be left behind if she did not voice her allegiance. "You were planning to leave me out, weren't you?"

"Yes, we were but-"

"Here comes the but."

"But, we it will look unprofessional if we take a female along with us," Hakuba said the first plausible explanation that came into his head. He knew she would protest if they told her it was for her own safety.

"That's wrong," Kaito interjected. "Tantei-kun is almost always with that girl when I see him. Aoko, we'll just have to disguise you. I've got plenty of female disguises. You can be an old lady, a businesswoman or a maid. Anything is possible with my disguises!"

"I always knew you secretly cross-dressed, Kaito."

"Do you want to come with is or not?"

***

"Conan-kun, there's some visitors for you," Ran poked her head through the doorway of the bedroom that the boy in question shared with her father to see him working on his homework. She could have sworn that he had been reading a book with a complicated name on the front just before she spoke, but she put it out of her mind. He couldn't read complicated words like that.

Conan looked up without much enthusiasm. "Genta and the others? I'll be along in a few minutes."

Ran shook her head. "No it's three people that I that I don't recognise."

Conan's interest was piqued. "I'm coming now," he said surreptitiously kicking the fascinating forensic science book that he had been reading under the bed and bounded down the stairs to the detective office.

He came face to face with three people of varying ages that he had never seen before in his life. One was your average salary man with black hair and suit and a forgettable face, one was a young women in a low cut top, short skirt and black stilettos and the third was a dark haired teenager dressed in tight purple skinny jeans and red converse. He didn't know what to think so he absorbed every detail their appearances.

Conan sat guardedly down on the sofa opposite the with his stun gun wristwatch open behind his back and the other was primed to activate his belt even though he was wearing slippers instead of his trainers. He couldn't afford any mistakes. They were obviously not his parents. The woman could be Vermouth in disguise; she liked her high heeled shoes and the men could be Gin and Vodka. Kogoro Mori was snoring blissfully with his head slumped on his desk behind a mountain of beer cans so he couldn't rely on any help from that quarter.

"Good afternoon," Conan greeted, having no idea how the conversation was going to go.

"Hello," the woman said.

There was an awkward silence. They all stared at each other not knowing what to say. The teenager nudged the woman who in turn punched the man who winced.

"You explain it; you know the most of out of us."

The man cleared his throat, looked around to make sure there was no one else around and spoke in Kaito's Kid's voice. "So Tantei-kun, what do you know about APTX 4869?"

Conan jumped in his seat, unable to control his surprise at hearing Kid's voice. Then his brain processed what he had just said. Did Kid know who he was? He had always thought that he treated him differently like he was an adult, or maybe that was how he worked; he respected his opponents and didn't make assumptions.

"Kid? How-What do you know about it then? You can take your disguise off if you like." He pointed over at Kogoro Mouri. "You'd better knock him out first though. He has a tendency to suddenly wake himself up with his own snoring. Ran-neechan is upstairs so you don't have to worry about her."

"I didn't bring my full paraphernalia so it will have to be the taser or the syringe," Kaito answered digging through his pockets.

"Syringe is fine," Conan said hastily. It was less painful and obvious than a taser. Truth be told he believed that he Kogoro Mouri was beginning to suspect that he didn't solve his own cases and that his house guest had something to do with it so he didn't want to give him any evidence that something was going on behind his back.

Kaito sterilised part of Mori's arm with a wipe and injected the contents of the syringe he had found in his pocket. "He should be out for about three hours if I have used the right syringe," he announced pulling off his mask and wig once he had sat back down.

The black haired lady did the same and now she resembled Ran in face and hair. She had bags under her eyes and her eyes were slightly red. She smiled at him.

"It's nice to meet you. I'm Aoko Nakamori. You're cuter than I expected by the way."

Conan grimaced slightly. "Any relation to Inspector Nakamori? I suppose you are if Kid is here."

She nodded. "He's my father. The sulky teenager next to me is Saguru Hakuba in heavy disguise. I believe you two have met."

Conan eyed up the denim clad legs and the converse and tried to match it with the prim suit wearing blonde detective he had met twice. No, he couldn't see it.

Hakuba guessed what he was thinking. "I got forced into this outfit; he thought it would be funny to put me in the tightest pair of skinny jeans he could find. I'm only keeping these uncomfortable jeans on because it is a good disguise."

"At least he didn't force you into and really low cut top and a really short, tight skirt," Aoko retorted.

Conan thought it would be a good idea to interrupt before it got out of hand. At least he knew they were definitely teenagers now and not members of the Black Organisation now,

"How do you know about APTX 4869?"Conan asked again wondering why they all had gone to such trouble to disguise themselves, it would have been sufficient for only Kid to disguise himself. Whatever the reason it probably wasn't pleasant.

"Actually we don't know much. That's why we came to you. Judging by your reaction you know more than us."

Hakuba proceeded to explain the events of the night before and included all the details about Snake, Pandora and Sherry. The Police were keeping as much out of the papers as possible as Hakuba had requested to maintain secrecy.

"It all makes sense now," Conan said. "You're only here because I'm your only lead to Sherry. I can only tell you what you need to know for now. I'll need to get permission for the rest."

Hakuba drew the case of APTX 4869 out of his pocket slowly and carefully watched Conan's reaction. His eyes were fixed on it and at the same time he seemed a little angry or scared as his fists were clenched and his knuckles were white.

"Does it contain pills?"

"You can open it yourself if you like."

He took the case from Hakuba and opened it gingerly as if he were afraid it was going to break. He picked out one of the tiny pills and stared at it for a while with a blank face. He was good at hiding his emotions now. He needed to hide his excitement.

"Can I keep one of these," he requested, longing to run over to Hakase's house and give it to Haibara. If she had the exact poison she should find it easier to make an antidote.

"On the condition you tell us what it is," Hakuba replied narrowing his eyes to watch Conan's eyes carefully to see if he was lying.

Conan took a deep breath and decided on what he should say.


	2. Chapter 2

Secrets and Lies: Chapter 2

"Well, APTX was supposed to be, is an untraceable poison, it can't be found in an autopsy," Conan explained watching their reactions carefully with a practised eye. "It was invented by a scientist called Sherry. Most members carry it around to test, or that's what used to happen."

Hakuba filed that little snippet to think about later. "Can you explain the codenames that they seem to use? Snake, Gin and Sherry?"

"As a whole I refer to them as the Black Organisation, it fits because they always wear black. Hmm, I've never heard of Snake before. He could be in a different branch. Most of them seem to have alcoholic codenames."

"Snake only seemed to be interested in Pandora so you could have a point about the different branch," Hakuba said. "Edogawa-kun, do you know who Sherry is?"

Conan flinched. He had been expecting this question from the start, but he still didn't quite know what to say. If he told them Haibara would either kill him or find some way to make him suffer. On the other hand this was the best lead he had in a long time and he couldn't just leave it. He was mulling it over when he was saved by the bell, literally. Or rather a knock at the door. He looked over at the silhouette and saw that it was Ran. Perfect.

"Conan-kun, I've made tea for you and your visitors. Can I come in?"

"Yes Ran-neechan," Conan replied, his voice automatically going up in pitch and sounding childlike.

Kaito had a few seconds of panic as he tried to put his mask and wig on properly in a matter of seconds. He was quick, but he had been surprised so his hands were shaky. Aoko had an easier time as Hakuba calmly helped her pull the mask over her face.

When Ran entered the room a salary man, businesswomen and teenager were politely waiting. Ran set the tray she was carrying down on the coffee table and started to pass the cups out. She couldn't help but wonder why these people would be visiting Conan and she was very protective and fond of him partly because he was like a mini version of Shinichi.

"So why do you want to talk to Conan-kun?" she enquired suspiciously.

"We, well we are friends of, um, his parents and we were in this area so we thought that we would drop by and see him," Aoko answered before Kaito and Hakuba could say a word.

"They're leaving after they finish their tea," Conan said pointedly.

"Now, wait a second," protested Kaito before being cut off by a glare from Hakuba to remind him to watch what he said. "You can't expect us to leave without a hug," he hastily ad libbed.

Conan scowled and made a face. He took a look at Ran and knew she would be disappointed if she didn't hug someone that was supposed to be friends with his parents. He gave Kaito a brief hug much to the delight of Ran and Aoko.

After saying good bye to Ran and Conan the three left the Detective Agency more puzzled and hungry for answers than when they arrived. As soon as they had left Conan ran upstairs to get his phone and shoes to run over to Hakase's house to give the pill to Haibara.

He knew that Kaito kid, Inspector Nakamori's daughter and Saguru Hakuba would be back and they wouldn't be so polite so he resolved to come to an agreement with Haibara on what he should tell them and how they should follow that lead. But that could come later; right now his priority was to get the poison to Haibara. He said good bye to Ran and left the agency at a brisk jog.

He looked around for any sign of Kid and the other two. He couldn't see them, but he knew that they weren't stupid enough to be seen so he took a few wrong turns and took a taxi part of the way there. He eventually arrived at the house next to his and rang the doorbell.

5 minutes later another taxi pulled up outside 2-22 Beika . After paying the driver Kaito, Aoko and Hakuba piled out wearing the same disguises they had worn before as they hadn't had chance to change.

"2-22 Beika," Kaito noted, then he realised the significance. "Hey Hakuba, that's like being next door to Holmes. Bet you're jealous."

Aoko punched him in the arm again. "This is serious Kaito."

He rubbed his arm and stuck his tongue out in reply. "At least I'm the one that thought to stick a tracker on him. We wouldn't know where he was otherwise."

"Quiet," Hakuba snapped as they climbed over the gate to the property.

Kaito refrained from looking up Aoko's skirt as she climbed over the gate after taking off her stilettos. She wished that Kaito hadn't chosen such an awkward disguise for her to wear; she could barely walk in the heels let alone climb anything or run.

It was the first time that Conan had ever seen Ai Haibara show such a positive reaction to something as he handed over the tiny pill of APTX. She normally remained expressionless or had a sarcastic smile. This time was different.

She had frowned at it at first, then the fact that she was holding the original poison that she had been trying to recreate for months had finally sunk in and her eyes had lit up with hope and she had genuinely smiled.

"You really surpass yourself sometime Kudo-kun," she commented archly before turning to Professor Agasa who was reading a science magazine to inform him that they were going down to her lab in the basement to analyse it.

Once they were in there she turned on her computer and put the poison under a microscope.

"How on earth did you get hold of it?"

Conan briefly explained about Kaitou Kid and his visit. He knew that she would get scared when she heard that Snake had been carrying a photo of her, but she took it well and she didn't have that rabbit-caught- in- the- headlights look she normally had when they were mentioned or when Vermouth was around. She really was improving. All she did was shrug and say that she expected everyone in the Organisation to know about her escape sooner or later since no one had ever escaped before without being hunted down and killed.

"I am going to have to tell them something about you. It is almost certain that they are being watched and they will eventually become desperate, feel trapped and could lead Them to us if they haven't already. We have to tell them something and help them. After all we haven't had a lead on the Black Organisation for ages."

"All right. We do need to help them, but not right now. I want peace whilst I am working on this. Please leave me now," she said transferring her attention to her computer, the solitary light source in the room. "Also don't hassle me about the antidote like you have a tendency to do. This will speed the development up, however it won't be instant."

"Fine," Conan replied dismissively and turned to go. He became aware that Professor Agasa was standing in the doorway with a panicked look on his face. He stammered for a second, and then he managed to speak coherently.

"This might sound strange. Shinichi Kudo is here."

"Kid," Conan said and cursed before running up the stairs. He had been followed after all. Kaito Kid had been cleverer than he had expected. He wouldn't mind co-operating with him now that he knew what he was about to tell him would be in capable hands.

***

5 minutes before

"So master criminal, how do we get into the house?" Hakuba enquired after they had peered discreetly through the front window to see Conan Edogawa disappearing down a flight of steps which presumably led down to the basement. There was also an elderly man in the room reading a magazine who stayed behind drinking coffee. Since there was someone in the house that would be able to hear if they broke in going in illegally was out of the equation. As it was a criminal matter Hakuba left it up to Kaito.

Kaito frowned and turned round from his position in a flowerbed to look at the house next door which was a large house that was more western style that the one they were currently outside. He recognised whose it was after he racked his memory because he could remember hearing the address somewhere before. He recalled doing some research into Shinichi Kudo and after learning that he was a teen detective and that he was the one that had clashed with him at the clock tower and had a slight connection to Conan Edogawa. He had seen photos of Shinichi and had noticed that there was a slight resemblance to himself in the face and hair and had put him on his list of detectives he could disguise as; a list that was getting shorter.

Kaito had even taken the trouble to read all the newspaper articles he could find about him and had noticed that Shinichi Kudo had dropped out of the news and Kogoro Mouri had taken his place almost immediately. In fact he had read on the internet that he had been assassinated after he had investigated a case that had been beyond him. Curiouser and curiouser. A simple idea presented itself in Kaito's mind. Luckily for him he was wearing a suit and he had a pot of hair gel somewhere in his pocket.

"What are you doing Kaito?" Aoko hissed as Kaito ripped off his mask and began to speedily gel down the unruly mess he called his hair.

"I'm going in through the front door. I'll wear a wire so you can hear everything that is going on."

Kaito placed a metal disc under his suit's collar and passed the receiver that was tuned to its frequency to Aoko before giving her a brief kiss to stop her arguing and walking off towards the gate. Aoko shrugged, knowing better than to argue with him and looked over at Hakuba to see if he understood any better than she did.

"Shinichi Kudo," he muttered recognising who Kaito was disguising as.

He always liked to know who his rivals were and the name Shinichi Kudo had always come up when teenage detectives were mentioned. So like Kaito he had researched him and found out that he was either dead or had dropped off the radar. He had noticed the resemblance between him and Kaito Kuroba. In fact the two of them could pass as brothers.

Aoko and Hakuba ducked behind a bush as Kaito scaled the gate again and pressed the buzzer once he was over the other side. They couldn't hear what he was saying, but it must have been successful as the gate was opened for him.

The front door was opened by the large elderly man with shoulder length white hair and round glasses. He still seemed to be surprised to be visited by his next door neighbour. Hakuba deduced that the man thought that he was dead or was in hiding. It looked like there was more to the disappearance of Shinichi Kudo than he had suspected.

The door closed behind them and they couldn't see anything else. It was all up to Kaito now. Aoko placed an one earphone in her ear and passed the other earphone connected to the receiver to Hakuba so they could both hear what was being said.


	3. Identities

Secrets and lies: Chapter 3

Kaito recognised the girl with light reddish hair that he had seen before with Conan as she followed Conan into the room and sat down in a computer chair near him and glared at him with her arms crossed. He took in the details of her face and realised exactly how closely she resembled the photo they had seen of Sherry. She was a like a mini version of her and she was also wearing a lab coat. Maybe she was her daughter, Kaito theorised.

He was impressed to see that she was better than Hakuba in the glaring department. However he didn't know why she would be glaring at her next door neighbour.

Conan walked over and stood next to her. He looked a little protective on the outside, but inside he was a little disconcerted to see what should have been his own face looking at him.

"Congratulations Kid," he said. "You followed me without being noticed."

"What do you mean?" Kaito asked surprised, barely managing to keep his voice from squeaking in bewilderment. He fought hard to keep his poker face straight. Things weren't looking good for him at the moment. "I'm Shinichi Kudo; I live in the house next door."

Inside he was panicking; he had expected to be able to keep up the pretence for at least a little while. How had they known? Even the elderly man had seemed a little forced in his manner when he had let him in; his eyes had kept shifting from side to side in alarm. There was definitely something up with Shinichi Kudo's disappearance. It looked like he was dead after all; all of their reactions to him implicated that.

Conan rolled his eyes. "Yes, of course you are. If you were him you would be able to answer this question correctly. What is the name of the old man that let you in?" he questioned pointing across the room. The man in question was currently watching television with the volume down low.

Kaito twitched guiltily. He had no idea of the man's name; he hadn't gone to that extent in his research. Tantei-kun had got him there. Whatever then man's name was he must trust the little girl and Tantei-kun enough to interrogate someone that had entered his house under false pretences. Well they did look like child geniuses.

He held his hands up in surrender. It was useless to deny it. "All right. I'm Kid."

Conan smirked. "For your information the man's name is Professor Agasa. He calls himself a genius inventor. I'm not too sure whether that is correct."

"Oi. Where would you be without that stun gun wristwatch and the voice modulating bow tie? Sleeping Kogorou wouldn't exist," he retorted.

"Just joking Hakase," Conan replied hurriedly. "Now what should we do with you, Kid? I would be a hero if I turned you into the Police or I could let the girl next to me use you for scientific purposes. I believe she is fond of human dissections."

Kaito paled, destroying his poker face. Then the penny dropped. It wasn't Tantei-kun's style just to turn him into the Police as he could blackmail him and he couldn't exactly imagine him killing someone.

Conan burst out laughing. "Sorry I couldn't resist it. Your face was hilarious. Anyway, I take it you are here about Sherry?"

"Is she that evil eyed girl next to you?"

"In a way she is this evil eyed yawny girl," he paused. "Sorry Haibara, I'm going to have to tell him."

"Fine," she said waving her hand dismissively. "You will have to explain about yourself too. Since you've let so many other people in on the secret too, you might as well tell him."

"Stop reminding me," he turned back to Kaito. "There is a very rare side effect that happens as a result of APTX 4869. As far as we know, it had only happened twice and the Black Organisation is not aware of this. The poison can shrink a person into a childlike state. I would estimate it to be their seven year old self."

"So this is Sherry as her seven year old self."

"Exactly."

The mental fog cleared for Kaito and a lot of things fell into place that hadn't made sense about Conan Edogawa. It would explain why he never batted an eyelid when presented with a murder case and had outsmarted him a few times."If we apply that to your situation; you aren't really Conan Edogawa. At a guess I would say you are Shinichi Kudo the detective. It would explain how you knew it was me immediately."

Conan knew that it was pointless to deny it and he might as well be truthful. "Yes, I am Shinichi Kudo. I overheard an illegal transaction between a member of the Black Organisation and corrupt business man. The next thing I knew I had been caught by his partner, knocked over the head with a pipe and I was having a pill shoved down my throat. They left me thinking I was dead," he explained bitterly.

"Instead you had become a seven year old," Kaito said filling in the gap. "But I don't know how you can be so calm about it. I would be furious if I had to leave my old life behind. I wouldn't be able to see my friends anymore, my family or my girl friend."

Conan nodded in agreement. "It's hard. Luckily I'm leaving with Kogorou Mouri so whenever there is a case involving the Black Organisation I hear about it and can investigate."

"Your residency with Kogoro Mori wouldn't have anything to do with his daughter?" Kaito saw an opportunity for some ribbing to get Tantei-kun back for his earlier joke.

His face instantly coloured and a red blush heated up his cheeks like a heater. That morning he had accidentally seen Ran getting dressed when she had left her bedroom door open and he still couldn't forget it. "Of course not Kid. This is a serious matter. Do you have any more questions? Sensible ones."

"Why is Sherry here and not with the Black Organisation?" Kaito enquired. It was something that had been bothering him since he had learnt who she was. Also he had unconsciously adopted Conan's habit of calling Them the Black Organisation.

"I leave this one to you to explain, Haibara."

She made no reply and moved her chair to sit in front of Kaito. Fortunately for him she stopped glaring; it made him feel unwelcome and out of place like he wasn't smart or capable enough to handle the Black Organisation.

"Please listen carefully and don't interrupt; I am only going to say this once. My real name is Shiho Miyano and I am eighteen years old. When I created APTX 4869 I was only carrying on my deceased parent's research and it was never supposed to be a poison."

Kaito forgetting the rules that she had set interrupted her. "What was it intended to do? It can't have been anything pleasant."

She cut him off with a glare that could have cut through metal and he regretted opening his mouth immediately.

"I said listen carefully. I haven't even told Kudo-kun the true purpose of the drug so I'm highly unlikely to tell you. I've told him almost all of my secrets; so let me keep at least one."

Conan shrugged his shoulders at Kaito to show that he had also tried to get her to tell him, but had failed. Kaito nodded slightly at him to show that he understood. It looked like they did have something in common besides appearance.

She coughed noticing and carried on, "I was never happy working for them and one day the breaking point came. They killed the only family that I had left; they killed my sister. I didn't want to be used by them anymore after that. I tried to use the APTX 4869 to kill myself. Instead my body shrank and I managed to escape."

She stared out of the window sadly and a tear slowly ran down her cheek leaving a trail behind. It didn't fit in with her cold demeanour so he knew it must be a poker face to hide her grief. Kaito gazed awkwardly at his feet trying to think of something to say but came up with nothing. He pulled out a pink handkerchief with a flowery border from nowhere and threw it to Conan who passed it to her so she could dry her face. She seemed surprised by his action and looked up at him.

"I'm sorry about your sister," he said, knowing that it wouldn't do anything to console her; it hadn't helped him when his father had died. It was an empty, commonly used phrase used by people who didn't know how it felt. "If it's any consolation to you my father was killed by Them too."

"It's all right," she replied calmly, gradually becoming her normal self again.

Conan had found out from experience that when she got this the last thing she need was company or someone saying that they were sorry so he normally left her alone. The only time he interfered was when it looked like she was going to kill or harm herself and that had hadn't happened in a while. So he was quite surprised that Kid had managed to deal with it, but then again he always seemed to have a way with women.

Haibara took a deep breath and continued again. "After I had escaped I ran here as i developed a hypothesis that Shinichi Kudo had shrunk to a child as his childhood clothes had gone missing the second time his house was searched. It was a hypothesis that turned out to be correct."

Conan took up the explanation. "I hated her at first, but when she offered to create an antidote I like her better," he winked and Haibara glared at him. He hastily changed the subject. "Besides she's a great help when it comes to solving cases and she makes awesome sarcastic comments."

She made a face in reply remembering some of the things he had made her do to help solve some cases like the time she had to pretend that she had appendicitis. "Well I have to keep you alive and happy otherwise I wouldn't have a test subject to test the antidotes on."

"You don't have to keep reminding me. It spoils occasions when I notice you staring at me like l am pig you fatten up for the slaughter."

Kaito say back in his seat, content to let them argue whilst he mulled what he had just been told over. A drug that could shrink a person existed? If someone had told him that a year ago before he had found out about Kaito Kid he would have laughed in their face. The past year had taught him a lot and stretched his boundaries. He had been shot at, been a victim of a love spell, robbed museums and cross dressed as his childhood friend twice. He couldn't wait for things to go back to normal. Kaito sighed.

He then became aware that Conan and Haibara were exchanging significant looks and their eyes kept darting to him. Kaito twitched nervously; this couldn't be a good thing. They could be planning to feed him the poison so the evil eyed girl could have another test subject or they could be planning to attack him in order to find out his real identity. His mind was going into overdrive. He decided it would be better for his sanity if he just enquired politely. After all they could just be innocently glancing at him and it could just be his paranoia.

"Is there anything wrong?"

"Well, we've told you our true identities and the nature of APTX 4869 as well as some sensitive information about ourselves. We feel that it would only be fair if..."

Conan finished off her sentence."...You do the same in return as you have a hold over us at the moment and that isn't the best thing for any of us."

Kaito stiffened. It as only natural that they would ask him to disclose his real identity after they had done so first. He had been surprised that Tantei-kun hadn't tried to work out who he was before, but maybe that showed that he valued him as a rival and didn't want to uncover him outside of a heist. He was slightly unwilling to confess he wasn't sure that the house he was in was secure and Tantei-kun could be recording the conversation as well for future evidence. He looked at his watch and noted that it had got pretty late and Aoko and Hakuba were probably very tired and the trains would stop running in about an hour and if he stayed to tell them they would be there for a few more hours and miss the train. Also he knew that Tantei-kun wasn't telling the whole truth about the Black Organisation and wouldn't unless he was coerced.

Kaito knew that he had now outstayed his welcome. He adjusted his collar whilst keeping his eyes fixed on Conan and tapped the bug a few times hoping that Aoko and Hakuba would understand and be ready once he got outside so they could run away quicker. He also dropped a smoke bomb from his sleeve into his hand in preparation for his abrupt departure. Now it was time to leave.

He stood up, brushed down his suit and bowed. "Who I am will have to come later. I don't quite trust you yet; you're keeping information back so I won't tell you until you tell me and besides it's quite a sensitive subject for me. When you feel like telling me more please contact Hakuba, he's in the phonebook. Good night."

He dropped the smoke bomb that he had prepared and secreted in his fist only to feel a sharp pin prick in his neck. His vision began to blur and swim around his eyes. He knew he must have been shot with some kind of tranquilliser dart and he tried to sharpen his vision with no avail. Then his legs went dead and he dropped to the floor.

When the smoke dispersed it was revealed that Kaito was lying on the floor with his legs out straight touching Haibara's chair. Conan was standing over him with the lid of his stun gun wristwatch open. In the confusion of the smoke he had aimed randomly at what he had estimated would be Kid's neck if he was still standing there and had fired. To actually hit him had been a stroke of luck. Now Kid was at their disposal.

"He couldn't really expect to leave without telling us anything in return," Conan commented, congratulating himself on his good aiming. "What do you think we should do with him Haibara?"


	4. Ichthyophobia

Secrets and Lies: Chapter 4

"...I am Shinichi Kudo the detective."

Unknown to everyone inside or in the garden of 2-22 Beika, there was yet another person listening into the conversation between Kaitou Kid, Shinichi Kudo and Shiho Miyano. This person was fond of the colour black and enjoyed drinking alcoholic cocktails.

That morning the entire Black Organisation had been thrown into disarray after finding out that the entire Pandora Branch of the Organisation that concentrated on finding Pandora and killing anyone who got their hands on it before them, had been destroyed by Kaitou Kid and a detective named Saguru Hakuba.

Luckily there had been one member of that branch left in the Police that had seen to the removal of the leader Snake's body and the captured members had known the procedure for this sort of situation that had never happened before; suicide. The only surviving member has also testified who was responsible as well as describing in detail the events of the night before, including the kidnapping of Aoko Nakamori who was supposed to be Kaitou Kid's lover and the head of the Black Organisation was currently planning what to do about them and had ordered everyone to stay away from Saguru Hakuba and Aoko Nakamori until he had made his mind up.

Of course everyone left in the Organisation was out for their blood and wanted them silenced; the only thing stopping them was Anokata and the punishment he would issue. Aoko Nakamori and Saguru Hakuba were being investigated and watched for now until the decision was made. It was known that she was staying at a friend's home and Saguru Hakuba had visited them that morning.

What wasn't so well known was that they had sneaked out and gone to Beika in disguise. However one member had noticed and followed them to the Mouri Detective Agency and 2-22 Beika and was listening in to their conversation and recording every word that was said. This person had heard everything including the escape of Sherry and the true identity of Conan Edogawa.

Luckily for them the agent that had bugged the Agasa residence was no other than Vermouth.

"Silly Silver Bullet," she muttered to herself. "He's lucky I'm around otherwise someone else could have heard this damning testimony."

* * *

Kaito had been knocked out and captured by the teenage detective Shinichi Kudo who was currently seven years old again and an escaped Black Organisation scientist known as Sherry who was in the same condition. Aoko's heart sank as she tried to get her head around it all. They weren't exactly the Black Organisation, but they would find out his identity and use it against him. It was every detective's dream to unmask the Kaitou Kid. She couldn't see an egoist like Shinichi Kudo keeping quiet about it. By the time the investigation was over the whole world would know.

She shivered in fear, pulled her earphone out and stepped boldly out of her hiding place in the shrubbery not bothering to avoid stepping on any flowers. Hakuba jumped and grabbed hold of waist and pulled her back.

"What the bloody hell are you doing?" he demanded keeping his voice down low to make sure that they hadn't been heard inside the house. He knew he probably didn't need to bother; they would have their hands full after knocking out Kaito.

I'm going to get my boyfriend back. They can't just knock him out and expect to keep him there," Aoko replied like it was a stupid question to ask. After all she was his girlfriend and she couldn't stand there and watch him be shot with a dart by a lying seven year old; that was completely wrong.

Hakuba sighed deeply and hid a faint smile. It hadn't been a wise decision to take Aoko with them. She may have helped Shinichi Kudo underestimate them and had been quick to make up a story for them visiting, but sometimes she didn't really have a grasp on what the sensible thing to do in a situation like this was. Also she was well known for her fiery tempers and impulsiveness which wasn't a good combination. Her traits were endearing, but they weren't always helpful.

"Listen to me, you cannot expect to be able to knock on the door and ask for him back," Hakuba whispered, covering her mouth with his hand in case she reacted by screaming at him. "Threatening them with a mop isn't an option either. Understood?"

She made a nodding motion with her head and he released her. She looked calmer now; the truth had sobered her anger. She turned to Hakuba as he seemed to be in charge now. He couldn't expect her to leave her boyfriend behind in the care of two seven year olds. He had to have a plan. Did he?

"Well, smart detective, what do you suggest we do then?"

* * *

Haibara gave Conan a cold look that would have frozen the sun. "Contrary to what you told him I don't have a penchant for human dissections. Also I don't need a lab rat at the moment so it's up to you what happens to him."

Conan nodded, he had known that Haibara would have no interest him now that she had her hands on the original APTX 4869. That left the decision up to him. He knew what he wanted to do with him. He ruffled the hair of the unconscious teenager on the floor and pulled at his face to check for a mask just in case. There wasn't one so he knew that the face he was currently seeing was Kid's real face.

"I've got a good idea of who Kid really is anyway, but it doesn't hurt to make sure."

"How noble of you not to have turned him in before," Haibara commented sarcastically before standing up and walking past. "I'm off to my lab. Don't disturb me."

"Actually I'm going to the need the basement for a few hours and maybe some fish," Conan replied without looking up at her. He looked closer at Kaito's face. "Hello Kaito Kuroba. It's nice to meet you."

Kaito slowly and gradually opened his eyes to find that he couldn't see anything. Everything was black. He was lying down on a cold and hard floor. He blinked, rubbed his eyes and blinked again with no avail. Was he really blind? He tried to slow down his rapid breathing and heartbeat that had suddenly escalated in panic. He remembered everything that had happened prior to him waking up perfectly; it comes in useful if you are a thief and have woken up in some strange situations.

Kaito recalled the last thing that had happened. He had been knocked out by Tantei-Kun a.k.a Shinichi Kudo who was currently in the form of a seven year-old. The thought of that humiliation was almost more unbearable that the thought of being blind. He groaned and put his head in his hands and realised that he could see the faint shape of his hands. Then it dawned on Kaito, he wasn't blind; he was just in a very dark place. It was probably the basement.

He felt in his pockets for something that could produce light, anything. But his pockets were completely empty. Even the false bottoms had been pulled out.

He patted his wrist experimentally in the vain hope that his watch was still there. Nope. Even his watch was gone, lost to the same place that all his other equipment had gone to. Probably Shinichi Kudo's pocket. He hated him for that. His watch was his pièce de résistance. In his watch he had a paperclip and a capsule of a sleeping drug for emergencies. If you pulled out the knob a certain number of times within a certain period of time it would spray out knockout gas which was handy if you needed a diversion. He hadn't used it yet, but the time to use it was probably approaching considering his current predicament.

Kaito had one last resort for escaping left. If this had been taken too he would be a little disgusted with whoever had searched him and he would also be at his wit's end and reduced to tearing his hair out. Kaito carefully felt around the inside of his mouth with his tongue to check the hidden paperclip that doubled as a useful lock pick that he kept in by his gums was still there. After a few revolutions his tongue encountered something thin and metallic. He felt like cheering out loud with joy, but he knew that was a ridiculous idea as it is best to celebrate when you are actually finished rather than halfway. Instead he cut short his mental celebration, spat out the paperclip into his hand and began to feel in the dark for the door so he could escape. He stepped forward and cannoned into a table and bruised his leg. He cursed under his breath and tried a different direction. This time he bashed his head on a bookshelf. Hoping that no one was watching or filming him he attempted another movement.

It took Kaito half an hour to bump into some more furniture, find the door and pick the lock. As a result he now had several bruises and cuts and he knocked off a table what had sounded like a heavy microscope holding a glass slide. He now felt like he would willingly murder Tantei-kun right in front of witnesses and would be happy to cope with the consequences.

He opened the door slowly and cautiously, wincing and covering his eyes as bright light flooded the pitch black basement. Luckily for him there was no one outside to make sure he couldn't escape. What awaited him was a flight of stairs and a shock.

Less than a metre away was a fish on a plate waiting for him. A Pacific Cod to be exact. Kaito gibbered and bit his tongue to stop himself from screaming. He looked at the fish again, it was intact and still had its head and eyes, but it was dead and so it wouldn't suddenly jump up and hurt him. That thought calmed him. It would be futile if he got this far only to be defeated by a dead fish on a plate. He kept repeating that quietly to himself. That thought calmed him. He sighed. He didn't want to murder Tantei-kun now; he would prefer to throw him in a room with all the criminals he had kicked footballs at and knocked their teeth out. After they had torn him to pieces he would feed the pieces to a bear. Those thoughts spurred him on and gave him the anger that he needed to get past the fish.

He held his breath, counted to five and jumped over the plate of fish. A thought suddenly struck him when he was in mid air. How had Shinichi Kudo known that he had Ichthyophobia? It was one thing to search him efficiently, but it was another to leave a fish right outside the basement. If it had been placed there deliberately to deter him then Shinichi Kudo must know who he really is. Kaito thought about it carefully and knew a confrontation would be the only way to find out.

With the fish behind him he bounded noiselessly up the stairs whilst thinking of the best way to confront Shinichi Kudo without being knocked out again. When he was just about to turn the corner he heard what sounded like Hakuba's voice and sounded like something that Hakuba would talk about with a fellow Sherlock Holmes nerd.

"I quite agree with you Kudo-kun it is extremely aggravating when obnoxious people claim that Sherlock Holmes and Dr Watson were gay and sometimes they write this dreadful thing called fanfiction."

Kaito rolled his eyes. Trust Hakuba to be complaining about that; he didn't like anything that tarnished his hero. At least he didn't wear his cape and deerstalker anymore. Did Hakuba tell Shinichi Kudo that he was afraid of fish, he hadn't been aware that he knew, but Aoko could of told him. Also where was Aoko? He couldn't hear her voice. If she and Hakuba were together before she should be there too.

He risked a peek around the corner. Shinichi Kudo and Hakuba were lounging on sofas opposite each other with a chessboard on a coffee table between them. Hakuba was white and Tantei-kun was playing black. There wasn't any sign of Professor Agasa. He could see Sherry tapping away at a computer in the corner. Aoko wasn't there. Damn Hakuba, he cursed. He must have left her somewhere. That wasn't very gentlemanlike of him. He caught sight of the clock on the wall. It was nearly midnight. He had been unconscious for a while.

Kaito didn't want to delay the inevitable any longer. He skipped up the last couple of steps and boldly walked across the room and threw himself down on the sofa next to Hakuba. He observed the Hakuba was being beaten at chess. Neither showed any surprise that he had escaped from the basement. In fact none of them looked up and Kaito didn't like being ignored.

"Can I have my watch back please? I feel lost without it. Look you can see my tan line."

Shinichi Kudo finally looked up from the chessboard and threw him a look. He didn't seem bothered that Kaito wanted a potential weapon back. He fished it out of his pocket and threw it at him. Kaito caught it neatly and wrapped it around his wrist.

"Your friend here had explained everything about you so I feel that I can trust you a little more now, Kaito Kuroba," Conan said waiting to observe his reaction.


	5. Chapter 5

Secrets and Lies: Chapter 5

Sadly Conan was disappointed. After all the shocks and surprises of the last couple of days Kaito didn't think that he had it left in him to bestartled at any new piece of information. After a tough mental tussle with a his greatest phobia and escaping from a pitch black basement, realising that his best rival had worked who he was really didn't faze him. He had a sleepless night the night before and just wanted to go home and sleep.

Kaito merely raised his eyebrows a little and shrugged his shoulders. "How did you find out? I have made Hakuba swear to keep it secret and it was a blood oath so he can't have told you."

Conan smiled. Now it was time to demonstrate his genius, but this one hadn't taken a lot of brainpower to work out. He pointed to a black leather photo album on the seat next to him.

"We've met before. It was when we were younger and there are a few photos of you and your father."

He had been looking through all the old photo albums in his house six months ago on the whim of his mother who wanted to make a scrapbook for some reason. He had stumbled on a photo of him, his father, a magician called Toichi Kuroba and his son called Kaito Kuroba. Conan had spotted the resemblance between the boy and Kaitou Kid and had phoned his mother to ask about Toichi Kuroba. He had been surprised to find that he had been the magician that had taught his mother and Sharon Vineyard the art of disguise. He also had done some research and found out that he had died in a tragic accident that had never really been explained.

He had all the pieces if front of him and he begun to see how they added up. The famous magician Toichi Kuroba had the night job of being Kaito Kid. Then he had died. Eight years later when his son was the same age as him a new Kaito Kid appeared. This one was his son Kaito Kuroba. It all made sense.

Conan had stashed the photo album at Professor Agasa's house in case his house was searched by the Black Organisation again. It had been just before Okiya Subaru which had been a good move as it would have been almost impossible to retrieve it again. He had been planning to confirm his suspicions at the next Kid heist that he went to, but there had never seemed to be a good opportunity to ask him.

"I don't remember, but you are right. My name is Kaito Kuroba," he admitted knowing he couldn't off denying it. "My father was Toichi Kuroba who was the first Kaitou Kid. I only found out last year that his death definitely wasn't an accident and he was called by a member of the Black Organisation called Gin."

Now it was Conan's turn to try to his reaction. His heartbeat sped up and his pupils dilated. Kaito observed that his hands were in fist. Across the room Haibara flinched and accidentally fell off her computer chair before looking sharply over at them. Conan shot her a look and she went back to typing on the computer. Both of them had involuntary reactions whenever certain members of the Black Organisation. Gin was Conan's most hated member and for Ai it was a tie between him and Vermouth.

"I know Gin... He's the one that fed me APTX 4869 and left me to die on the ground," he replied bitterly. "If you want to hunt him down and kill him I'm very willing to help you with the killing part and I think Haibara will too."

Kaito nodded and changed the subject. "How do you know that I have Ichthyophobia?"

"I asked my mother Yukiko Kudo about you. She told me about a time when your family came over for dinner. Apparently she cooked fish and you ran off screaming. Your father taught my mother the art of disguise for a film that she was in."

"Did you search me? Also what made you want to lock me up in that dark basement?"

"I searched you to make sure you didn't have any lethal weapons and Hakuba here advised me to take your watch. Locking you in the basement was partly revenge for all the times that you have humiliated me at heists and to pay you back for disguising as Ran when you stole the Black Star. I also needed you out the way for a few hours while I planned how to involve you and Hakuba," Conan explained moving his rook and putting Hakuba into check.

Hakuba made a face and bent down closer to the chess board to try to work out how to get out of check. "I knew that Kudo-kun didn't want to harm you in any way, the fact that he only knocked you out attested that. He could have hung you upside down and dangled a fish in your face if he really wanted to harm you. After you were sedated I decided that it would be a good idea to intervene before you did something that you might regret before you woke up."

"Thanks Hakuba," Kaito replied sarcastically. "I didn't particularly appreciate the fish comment. How long were you planning to keep me in the basement?"

"I knew that Hakuba and Nakamori-san would be around somewhere and wanted to lure them out. I thought that Nakamori-san would react if I did something to you and Hakuba would be forced to reveal himself which is exactly what happened. I wasn't going to keep you in there for very long."

"Talking of Aoko, where is she?"

"She kindly made dinner for use and said that she was going to wash the dishes and then she would come and give you some chocolate ice cream. By the way she wanted to rescue you immediately, but I stopped her from charging in," Hakuba informed him whilst moving his king out of check.

"I'll just go and see her. Mmm, chocolate ice cream."

It reminded Kaito of the night that he had confessed her; that was a happy memory that he intended to treasure forever. At the moment he couldn't think of any recent happy memories. He had been shot, had his girlfriend kidnapped and been knocked out and it didn't look like things were going to get any better for him.

Aoko was nowhere to be found in the kitchen when he sauntered in. The dishes had been done and were on the draining board. A white apron was thrown down on a work surface and a pair of slippers stood tidily by the back door which was wide open. Kaito panicked at her disappearance coming to the conclusion that she had been kidnapped again. Then he after poking around the kitchen he discovered that the bin was empty and didn't have a bag in it. He deduced that Aoko had gone outside to put the rubbish out to help Professor Agasa. Kaito sighed. Sometimes Aoko was too helpful and kind to other and didn't think about the consequences. She must have assumed that it was safe enough for her to walk out to the gate by herself in the middle of the night. Kaito knew he was going to have to have a word with her when he found her.

He stuck his head out the kitchen door. "Aoko seems to have gone to put the rubbish bag out without asking. I'm going to find her. If I don't come back within five minutes something bad has happened. Bye."

Kaito turned and ran out the back door in his socks before Conan and Hakuba could reply.

Conan and Hakuba exchanged looks. The Black Organisation could have tracked them to the house and could be watching. And Aoko had gone outside by herself and could be walking into a trap.

"I think we should go after him. Just in case."

They hurriedly grabbed their shoes and sprinted out the back door after him. Neither of them saw anything out the ordinary until they were outside the front. Kaito was kneeling by what looked like a small bundle of clothes. A feeling of dread settled in Conan's stomach. He knew what it was before they stepped closer. After getting closer Hakuba saw that it was a child lying on the road, motionless and with their eyes closed. A young child with unruly black hair that was wearing oversized clothes with a piece of paper lying on top. They were the same clothes that Aoko Nakamori had been wearing that day.

"Is it...?" Conan asked softly, but he knew what it was. He had been the first victim of it.

Kaito nodded sadly. He didn't know what to say after looking down at a seven year old Aoko. She was unconscious, but alive. He had thought he was capable of protecting Aoko and could keep her out the clutches of the Black Organisation despite having failed once. Now he had failed in his duties.

A solitary tear ran silently down his cheek and dripped onto Aoko's child sized hand. A sight that would be permanently imprinted on his memory. He picked up the piece of paper, read it and screwed it up in his hand. He felt a hand grip his shoulder. He looked up and saw that it was Hakuba. He pulled Kaito up with an expressionless face and moved his gently aside and took his place by Aoko. Hakuba delicately picked up Aoko's wrist as if he was afraid that it would break and checked her pulse. Finding that there was a steady beat with no abnormalities he picked her up bridal style. He avoided looking at Kaito and addressed Conan instead.

"I think that we should continue this inside."

"She'll be okay. She's unconscious because she had been chloroformed and needs to sleep it off. The dose doesn't seem to have been that big," Haibara observed after examining Aoko on her bed in her bedroom that was completely plain and devoid of anything personal. "She has been fed APTX 4869 and seems to have shared mine and Kudo-kun's reactions to it. That point is interesting and will aid my research."

She saw that a depressed Kaito was sitting on her floor with his head in his hands.

"Lighten up Kid. At least she is alive. Although she might be better off dead if she is wanted the by the Organisation."

"Shut up," Kaito snapped in return glaring at her.

He unclenched his fists for the first time since he had found Aoko. He threw the screwed up note at Conan who had been wondering when it was a good time to ask about it. "Explain. Now."

Conan flattened the note out onto the floor so everyone could read it and gasped as well as swearing.

I heard you were hiding some fugitives. I thought I would do you a favour and make it easier for one of them to hide. That's the least I can do.

X

P.S. Be careful. Everyone is out for them.

"It's Vermouth," Conan stated simply knowing he was going to have to explain their awkward relationship.

Haibara flinched and sat down on the floor next to Kaito, shaking at the thought of Vermouth being nearby although she had detected nothing.

"How did this Vermouth person know we were here and are they helping or hindering us?" Hakuba enquired, puzzled at how Aoko had been dealt with so easily and quickly. If one member could track them down despite their disguises it said a lot about their skills.

"Vermouth is one of the most skilful members of the Black Organisation and a favourite of the boss. She is the best I've seen with disguises and she knows that I'm Shinchi Kudo. Luckily for me she seems to have a soft spot for me and she sometimes covers up for me. I don't really know why," he admitted ruefully wondering, not for the first time why Vermouth was always so willing to help him. He may have saved her life, but she had repaid him for that a while ago.

"She must know something about that poison that we don't if she was so sure that it would shrink Aoko rather than killing her. Sherry? Any ideas?"

Haibara looked up from her sulk on the floor and thought about it. "it's most likely something to do with the age of the person that you are administering it. Nakamori-san, Kudo-kun and I were all teenagers of a similar age so youth could be the factor."

"Would that help you make the antidote any faster?"

"Maybe."

Kaito held one of Aoko's small hands while she slept marvelling at how soft it was. He looked at what she was wearing and realised how exposed she was as she had been wearing a low cut shirt that say.

"Sherry, do you have any spare clothes that Aoko could wear?"

"In my wardrobe," Haibara replied standing up and rummaging through her chest of drawers and wardrobe.

Conan stood up too and glanced at his watch. "I think that it would be best if we got some sleep. Nakamori-san can share with Haibara and I'll get everyone else some futons so we can sleep downstairs. It's been a long day."


	6. Appearances

Secrets and Lies: Chapter 6

Vermouth watched the scene that unfolded before her eyes with no emotion. Kaitou Kid was leaning over the girl that she had just fed APTX 4869 to and Shinichi Kudo was looking around suspiciously. She had been lurking around the Agasa residence waiting for one of the three to be alone and for a good opportunity to strike. She had been waiting for hours and she had grabbed her chance when the Nakamori girl and appeared in her sightline carrying a black plastic bag and was heading for the rubbish bin by the gate. Vermouth couldn't believe her luck. The audio feed from inside the house and become very uninteresting since Kid was knocked out.

She had crept up silently behind the oblivious and unsuspecting girl armed with a handkerchief that she had hastily doused with chloroform. She had grabbed the innocent girl who was humming to herself with an iron grip and pressed the handkerchief to her nose and waited for her to go limp and stop struggling. After a few seconds she slumped in Vermouth's arms and Vermouth laid her gently on the ground. She looked around her. Luckily the street was quiet at this time of night so no one would see what she was about to do. She had to work quickly now though as someone would be coming out from the house to investigate as the girl wouldn't exactly be coming back as herself and it would be a while until she woke up.

From her pocket she drew out a silver metal case which was identical to the one that had been filched from the dead body of Snake. She opened it, plucked out a single pill and popped it into the girl's mouth.

Her body began to smoke and tremble violently as her bones melted and shrunk. There weren't any cries or screams as Vermouth had been kind enough to knock her out first so there wouldn't be any noise to attract attention. Vermouth observed the sight, fascinated that it really was possible. She had harboured a minor concern that the poison would kill the girl instead of shrinking her and she would have another dead body on her hands, but she had been pretty sure that she would shrink like Shinichi Kudo and that traitor Sherry due to how similar all their ages were. After minute or so the girl's body stopped shaking and smoking and lay still. Vermouth leant down for a closer examination. The girl's facial features now definitely belonged on someone younger and she was certainly now the size of a seven year old. Vermouth stood up and smiled.

"Sherry did a good job with this strain. An improvement on her parents. Shame no one above the age of 20 can use it without dying," she muttered whilst writing a quick note to leave for her Silver Bullet to explain. She was sure that he would understand.

She withdrew into the black shadows when Kaitou Kid who had escaped from his captivity came running and was followed by the blonde detective and Shinichi Kudo a minute later. She was satisfied with her night's work. She had helped her Silver Bullet deal with some troublesome people that could potentially blow his cover.

* * *

Aoko cracked open an eyelid with difficulty. Her eyelids felt like they were weighed down with granite. When she managed to open both eyes her vision was blurred. She blinked a few times and it cleared revealing that she was in an unfamiliar environment. She was lying in a comfortable bed in a small room with white walls and plain wooden furniture. The duvet was a pale cream colour and the sun was flooding in through the curtains. Aoko yawned and looked down at herself and noticed that she was wearing pink pyjamas and her legs seemed to have shrunk overnight.

She rubbed her eyes with surprise. Surely she wasn't that small. She pulled the covers back and looked at her legs and arms. They had shrunk and looked they belonged on a seven year old. A seven year old... Like Shinichi Kudo as Conan Edogawa. She had shrunk like him. She tried to recall the events of the night before, but all she could remembers was cooking dinner for everyone and realising that the bin was overflowing and needed to be emptied. So she had walked out to the rubbish bin that she had glimpsed on her way in. She remembered nothing past that.

Aoko pinched herself on the off chance that she was dreaming and hadn't really shrunk. She winced and knew that she was wide awake and wasn't still asleep. She swung her legs off from the bed and stood up shakily as she always felt a little weak in the morning. Aoko had a blinding headache that was hurting her head and the sunlight shining into her eyes didn't help either.

A yawn from somewhere on the floor below her made her jump. She looked down and saw that the seven year old Sherry had been sleeping on a futon next to the bed and she had just accidentally woken her up. Aoko sat back down on the bed again to give her some space. Sherry sat up slowly and blinked the sleep out of her eyes. Aoko smiled silently to herself at the state of Sherry's hair.

"Good morning Nakamori-san," Sherry greeted sleepily lacking her usual cold demeanour. "If you want to know why you are so small I'll explain once I wake up properly. I'm not a morning person."

Aoko nodded and glanced round the bedroom wondering if it was Sherry's. "Is this your bedroom Sherry-san?" she enquired politely absorbing the bland, colourless walls and the lack of a personal touch. Her bedroom at home reflected her personality completely and she had taken pleasure in decorating it personally. This bedroom seemed to be the exact opposite.

"Yes. Please don't call me that name though. I hate it. Just stick with Haibara-san to ease difficulties," Haibara replied sounding a little more alert and displeased.

Aoko decided that she seemed more like her usual self and it would be okay to ask now. "Okay, Haibara-san. What happened last night? Was it something to do with APTX 4869?"

Haibara looked sharply at her and was reminded of her sister like when she looked at Ran Mori in the face. She didn't want to see Aoko cry because she explained it too harshly. She sighed. It would be hard hearing that you wouldn't be able to see your family and friends again and that an antidote would never be found. It would be better for her if Kudo-kun explained.

"On second thoughts. I'll get Kudo-kun to explain. He is more sympathetic than me."

"...We've managed to work out that you were chloroformed and fed APTX 4869. Actually you were lucky that you were unconscious when the change happened. I can't describe how much it hurts being shrunk," Conan explained as kindly as he could to a nervous Aoko in the front room.

"And it was administered by a member of the Black Organisation called Vermouth who was doing you a favour because she likes you. Have I got it right?"

Conan flushed, annoyed at her terminology. "Please don't put it that way Nakamori-san. I don't know why she did it." He paused and carried on. "You're taking this quite well. Better than Kuroba anyway. You're very calm." Her coolness at being told that she wouldn't be able to go back to her normal was alarming, but she had been probably taught by Kid how to keep up a poker face.

Aoko shrugged casually determined not to show her real emotions until she was alone. "I was angry at first, but then I remembered that you and Sher-I mean Haibara-san have dealt with it. Besides the Black Organisation aren't looking for a seven year old so Vermouth had helped."

She smiled optimistically looking like any other normal seven year old when they were presented with sweets. Conan felt a pang of guilt inside. She looked so much like Ran. He didn't want to burst her happy bubble and tell her that she would have to lie to everyone she knew for the rest of her life or until an antidote was found which could be never. He didn't like to mention that her boyfriend didn't want to see her either and had instructed them to keep her away for now because he blamed himself.

"Where is Kaito?" Aoko asked the very question that he had been dreading whilst looking around the empty front room. "And Hakuba?"

"I'm over here." Hakuba's voice came from the doorway. He walked over and sat down next to Aoko determined to make up for her boyfriend's boorish behaviour.

"Are you feeling all right?" He kissed her hand daintily like a perfect gentleman. "I like your pyjamas. Hmm, pink bunny rabbits. I didn't expect Haibara-san to own anything like that."

Aoko snatched her hand away as politely as possible. "She said someone called Ayumi gave them to her as a present and she never wore them. Where's Kaito?"

Conan and Hakuba exchanged significant looks and tried to think of way to make light of Kaito's current black mood. They had spent the previous night trying to make him feel better, but he kept shrugging them off.

"He's busy outside feeding his doves and doesn't want to be interrupted in case they get scared," Hakuba hastily improvised feeling like criminal that should be arrested.

In fact Kaito was sulking in the bathroom sitting on the toilet seat. His dark mood was self inflicted. He blamed himself for the attack on Aoko that could have killed her. If he wasn't so hot headed Tantei-kun wouldn't have felt there was a need to tranquillise him and he would have been there with Aoko and she wouldn't have been attacked.

He was trying to avoid Tantei-kun and Hakuba as much as possible. Their sympathetic pats on the shoulder made everything worse as it constantly reminded him. They also kept telling him that it was not his fault, but those words only made it more painful for him as words like that always sounded unbearably false. He had only gotten a few hours of sleep that night due to the guilt he felt and in his mind he kept playing the scene when he found Aoko over and over.

A knock at the bathroom door caused him to almost jump out of his skin. His body stiffened at the person's voice. It was Aoko, the very person he didn't want to see right now.

"Hello? Is anyone in here?"

Kaito felt like crying again. Her voice was the exact same as when they had first met at that clock tower and he had presented her with a rose for the first time. He remembered it very well as that was when he had fallen in love with her. It was his luck that she happened to be the daughter of the policeman that was trying to hunt him down.

Not wanting to face or talk to her he hastily scanned the bathroom analytically for a sensible hiding place. The only one available was the bath. He dived in and drew the plastic shower curtain across just as Aoko opened the door. Kaito leaned back from the edge as far as he could so she wouldn't be able to see his silhouette.

He held his breath listening carefully. He couldn't hear the toilet or the tap so he knew something wasn't right. He thought he could hear a noise the sounded like muffled sobs. The noise got louder and he could make out words too.

"It's all my fault. I shouldn't have gone out by myself. What was I thinking?" Aoko sobbed plaintively plopping herself onto the floor.

She blames herself, Kaito thought sadly. She needn't. I brought her into this mess in the first place. If I hadn't confessed to her the Black Organisation wouldn't have tracked her down and kidnapped her and she would be normal and not caught up in this. However something told Kaito that Aoko would be upset if the only way she found out that he had been lying to her about Kaito Kid was when she saw his dead body.

"I'm a midget now and Kaito is avoiding me because he doesn't love me anymore," Aoko continued and he could also hear her hit the sink. "I can't even hit anything properly or hold a mop. Damn. It's my fault so I should stop complaining."

Kaito whipped back the shower curtain furiously nearly giving Aoko a heart attack. After getting over the fright she looked him deliberately in the eye ready to face him.

"You don't love me anymore, do you?" she said calmly. "I'm the wrong age."

That was the last thing that Kaito had been expecting to hear. It looked like Aoko still possessed the ability to surprise him and do the unexpected. That was one of the things that he loved about her. He leapt over the side of the bathtub and grabbed her by the shoulders.

"Where on earth did you get that idea from? I would still love you if you were an 80 year old with wrinkles. Appearances don't matter."

Just to prove his point he bent down and kissed her on the lips like he normally did. Aoko blushed just like normal

"See," Kaito said, pleased that he had proved to her that he still loved her and wasn't rejecting her just because her appearance had changed.

"But you can't do that it public for the obvious reasons," Aoko reprimanded sounding like her usual self again.

Kaito took her hand. "It doesn't matter. Come on, let's go get breakfast. I'll make your favourite; pancakes."


	7. Plots and Plans

Secrets and Lies: Chapter 7

Outside the bathroom Hakuba was waiting. What exactly he had been waiting for was unknown. He had deduced that Kaito would be in the bathroom and had suggested to Aoko that she should look in the mirror at herself so she could get the full effect of the transformation that the drug had caused and so she wouldn't underestimate the Organisation again.

As Kaito and Aoko passed holding hands, Hakuba winked at Kaito who scowled in annoyance and a tiny amount of embarrassment as he suspected that he had been listening in.

"After breakfast Kudo-kun and I would like a word with you. It's nothing major," Hakuba called after them. Kaito nodded in reply, not really listening.

For breakfast Kaito made two stacks of perfectly browned pancakes for himself and Aoko. He surprisingly hadn't blown up the kitchen in any way, due to Aoko standing threateningly close to a mop. Either it was her influence or he was getting better at cooking. Aoko complained when they sat down to eat that he was hogging all the chocolate sauce for himself and attempted to get revenge by drawing a fish with strawberry sauce on his pancakes. She pouted sulkily which Kaito found quite cute when he explained that he wasn't afraid of fish anymore. He offered to make it up to her by letting her sit on his lap which she refused with a punch and a furiously red face.

Conan and Haibara watched the couple indulgently, both smiling at their playful banter and how different Kaito was when he was around Aoko. Conan felt a little jealous that Kaito had been able to tell the truth about his criminal alter ego to the girl that he loved, but he consoled himself by reminding himself that their circumstances were very different. Haibara found almost found herself wishing that someone treated her like that and accepted her for what she was rather than her appearance and loved her, but she remembered that she was determined to have a stone wall around her heart to protect it from further cracks.

Conan hated to interrupt the happy couple, but he did. "Sorry Kuroba, Hakuba has got some ideas and wants us to listen to them."

"Can I come too?" Aoko asked turning around and wiping chocolate sauce off her cheek from when Kaito tried to feed her.

"Hakuba says that it would be best for you if you didn't get involved right now and agree with him. We'll discuss your new arrangements later."

Aoko opened her mouth to argue when she was joined by Haibara who took her by the arm and spoke to Conan.

"Don't bother involving me either. I've got to work on an antidote. You can help me Nakamori-san."

Aoko closed her mouth and smiled at her. Conan shot Haibara a grateful glance for stopping Aoko from arguing as he knew Kaito was weak against her and would insist on having her there too. Haibara and Aoko headed off to the basement leaving Kaito and Conan behind.

"Are you okay now Kuroba?"

"I'm better now," Kaito answered as Hakuba entered the room and sat down. "So what ideas do you have then?"

Hakuba fluffed his blonde hair; a trait that Kaito found annoying and cleared his throat like magician about to introduce his next trick. He had thought they had better get on with bringing the Black Organisation down for Aoko and Kaito's sake as well as his because the longer it was the more chance that they would be hunted down and killed.

"As we know there are a large number of spies and paid informers in the Police. Some of them were wiped out when they killed themselves two days ago, but there are still plenty left that will be a risk of we investigate the Black Organisation through the Police. Most of the spies and informers probably don't know who they are really working for and are possibly paid through an intermediary or a third party," Hakuba started with his weakest idea. "So we shouldn't bother trying to find them and arrest them as they won't be able to tell us much. Instead we could use them to pass false information to the Black Organisation."

Conan nodded in agreement. He was glad that he had more people to help him as they came up with different ideas than him. "I don't know how we would find them though. It's going to take a long time, that's why I have never really considered doing that before. I say we use that as a backup plan if all else fails."

Kaito sceptically raised his eyebrows thinking of how long it could take and how many lives would be ruined. Fighting against the Black Organisation had killed his father and he hoped that no one else would follow his fate. "What's your next idea Hakuba? I hope it's better than your first."

Hakuba sensibly ignored Kaito. He had had enough of experience with Kaito's comments before and knew better than to respond. "My next idea is that we could lure them out and use that to trap them or find out more information about its members."

"What's the bait going to be to lure them out?" Kaito enquired nervously, fearing that it was going to be a person.

Hakuba smiled knowingly. Kaito could swear that his teeth had suddenly become sharper and more vampire like. "Why, you of course. After your last heist they are bound to be targeting you."

Kaito thought quickly, searching for a way out of it. "But it will be obvious since they know that I've destroyed Pandora and that we know each other. In fact they probably know who I am already."

Hakuba's vampire smile disappeared. "True. There is always Shinichi Kudo or..."

Kaito guessed who Hakuba was thinking of that would be perfect bait for the Black Organisation. They both looked over at Conan for his views.

"You want to use Sherry. It's an idea-not one that I'm particularly happy with, but we would need to wait for an antidote and that could be a long time to wait."

"You could be the bait if you like Hakuba. Next idea please and it better not involve Aoko," Kaito threatened. "Or your hair colour might be changing permanently."

"All right," Hakuba said feeling a little irked that everything was going wrong so quickly, but then the criticism was why he asked them what they thought and they had pointed out some undeniable holes. "Kudo-kun gives us a list of all the members of the Black Organisation that he knows and all the cases he knows that they have been involved in and we look for a correlation."

"That is basically saying we don't have a plan."

"We could use it to work out who the spies in the Police are by requesting those case files," Conan suggested, knowing he was going to be calling some favours from Takagi and Sato. Well, he had solved a lot of cases for them and they were always willing to help. "I'll write a list."

"Any ideas yourself Tantei-kun? You must have tried to come up with some at the beginning. Why are you living with Kogoro Mouri and making him famous? There must be something in that."

"My plan had always been to make him successful so he gets more cases and some of those cases are bound to involve the Black Organisation and some of them have, but I've changed it now," Conan explained remembering how shaky he was after he was first shrunk. "I'm in contact with some FBI agents that have the same goal as me, but they don't know who I really am; they just think I'm a very smart child who stuck his nose in where it didn't belong."

"Are the FBI doing it secretly, they must be to keep themselves safe?" Hakuba wanted to know. He guessed that they were as they would have been killed already.

"Yes. There is a CIA agent of a fairly high rank in the Organisation. Her alcoholic codename is Kir. We could ask her for some inside information, but I would have to go through the FBI to ask and I'm reluctant to do that as they would ask a lot of questions. Also Kir's position has been a little precarious since a certain incident and there hasn't been any contact from her in a while."

Hakuba understood what he was implying. "She could be dead then or in very deep."

"I think that idea should go on the maybe list," Kaito commented beginning to lose interest and brought a dove out from in his jacket and stoked its head.

"Have you got any ideas yourself?" snapped an annoyed blonde detective finally at his breaking point.

"Not at the moment," Kaito admitted reluctantly and hastily racked his brains for ideas. "Can't you ask Vermouth to give you some information?"

Conan pulled a face remembering other times he had. She had never given him a straight answer. "I don't know how to contact her and she always talks in riddles and walks off when you think you have got somewhere with her."

"Can't you ask your father Yusaku Kudo to help? He was my father's greatest rival. He should be able to do something." Kaito had read the accounts in the newspapers of his father's heists on a fan website he had found and Yusaku Kudo had been mentioned in every one of them. He had figured that he had been a detective like Hakuba that had sworn to defeat Kid. He had only just realised that he must be Shinichi Kudo's father.

"That is a good idea. I'll call him later and ask him for some suggestions if nothing better is suggested. I have asked him to not help me, but I think your current situation might call for it. Any other suggestions Kuroba?"

"I think we need some more people to help. Does anyone else know about APTX 4869?"

"Good point Kuroba," Hakuba agreed. "Doesn't that hot-blooded Osakan know? What was his name again? Himeji...? No, Heiji. Heiji Hattori. You could ask him to come."

Conan thought about it. They did need more people and Hattori was a good detective and was aware of some of the Black Organisation members, but he wasn't aware of some of the more recent occurrences. However sometimes Hattori rushed in without thinking of the consequences. He could think of a few examples. Then again he hadn't seen him in ages and it was good to talk to fellow teenage detectives as he rarely was able to talk to any properly.

"I'll call him as well. He does know; he caught me out the second time I met him. I slipped up badly."

"How long do you estimate that it will take that creepy little girl to make the antidote?"

Conan pulled a face and mentally calculated how long it had been since he had laid eyes on Ai Haibara for the first time that day at school. It had been quite a while ago. He didn't really think about it anymore; he had become used to living as Conan Edogawa. "It has been around two years."

"Two years!" Kaito spluttered in horror at the implication. "Has she actually made any progress yet?"

"A little. She has made some temporary ones. However nothing really concrete and they keep getting weaker."

Kaito moaned thinking of how long Aoko might have to wait and the amount of time it was going to take to destroy the Black Organisation. "Should I suggest to her that she hurries up a little?"

Conan sniggered. He could picture it happening and her response as he had suggested it a few times and instantly regretted it. "I'd love to see you do that. Seriously though, don't. You'll regret it."

"Yes, you will Kid," Haibara threatened appearing suddenly behind where Conan was sitting giving everyone a fright. She glared at Kaito; she hated being hurried with her scientific work and to have Conan doing it was annoying enough let alone a cocky thief. "I hear you've recently got over your Ichthyophobia. I'd hate to accidently bring it back by throwing you in a tank of piranhas."

The threat was enough to make Kaito go pale, gulp and keep his mouth shut. Hakuba watched his face, amused at how he couldn't keep his precious poker face when threatened by fish.

"Do you need something Haibara?" Conan asked tilting his head back so he could see her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This fanfiction is hurting my head in a good way as it is the most complex one I have written so far. I'm going to have to take liberty with some facts about the Black Organisation that are assumed and not actually known. Please review-it keeps me going.


	8. Peanut Butter and Blueberry Jam

Secrets and Lies: Chapter 8

Haibara unceremoniously threw a folded up piece of paper at him. It fell into his lap. She had a satisfied look on her face like she had succeeded in something.

"I've got an important shopping list for Hakase. He needs to go out to purchase the items as soon as possible. They are a vital part in my research."

Conan scanned the contents of the list with a single raised eyebrow at all the alcohol that was listed. Most of it was Chinese as that seemed to be the strongest alcohol that worked the best in the antidotes.

"Are you trying to turn the basement into a wine cellar or something? I didn't know that peanut butter and blueberry jam had an effect though. I was under the impression that it was alcohol not sweet things."

At Hakuba's questioning glance he explained how he had discovered that liquor was a temporary antidote. It had been an incredible stroke of luck for him and later Haibara as it had probably saved her life at the incident with Pisco at the hotel and it had fuelled her research.

"When I met Heiji Hattori for the first time I had a bad cold and he gave me some Chinese liquor to help get rid of it."

"Irresponsible as always," Hakuba interjected not surprised for some reason that the hot blooded detective he had met would offer alcohol to a seven year old.

"It didn't cure my cold; it made it a lot worse, but later that day in the middle of a case I turned back to my normal self much to my surprise. I have to thank Hattori for that. Knowing that fact has helped me a lot. Unfortunately it only works when you have a cold."

"What's the peanut butter and blueberry jam for?" Kaito asked not seeing how it fitted in.

"It's for my personal consumption thank you very much," Haibara snapped. She was always sensitive about her blueberry jam and peanut butter after it turned out the Hakase had been ordering imported goods behind her back. "If you all want an antidote you are going to have to keep me happy."

"The only shop that would sell all this would be the one opposite the train station," Conan commented folding up the list. "I'll give this to Hakase and when I come back we can make arrangement for Nakamori-san."

"It's the summer holidays at the moment so we don't have to worry about enrolling you in school for the moment," Conan informed Aoko after giving the shopping list to Hakase with a few extra items added.

Aoko was sitting on Kaito's lap with an embarrassed red face as Kaito had grabbed her and refused to let go until she sat on his lap. He was having quite a lot of fun embarrassing her. It was the one thing that felt normal and reminded her of her old life.

"But the first thing that you need to do is to explain to your father that you're hiding somewhere safe until the Black Organisation has been captured."

"But he won't recognise my voice."

In reply Conan undid his bowtie and adjusted the dials on it after speaking into it a few times. Kaito, Aoko and Hakuba looked mystified. Conan caught their looks and took pity on them. It was a natural reaction; he would have thought anyone speaking into a bowtie before he had been shrunk was mad.

"It's a Voice Modulating Bowtie. I can imitate anyone's voice with it."

Hakuba recalled the he had a watch that shot out tranquilliser darts and he paired the two together. The ability to knock out a person and use their voice. That explained why Kogoro Mouri was so slow despite having solved so many cases. Knocking him out must be faster than giving him hints.

"I suppose that and your tranquillising wristwatch are the origins of Nemuri no Kogoro?"Hakuba said with a smug smile on his face at having worked it out.

"Correct," he replied unconcernedly and passed it to Aoko.

She spoke into it cautiously and her voice sounded exactly like her original one before she had been shrunk. However Kaito wasn't impressed. Why use a machine when he could change his own voice at will? He reminded himself that not everyone had is knack at impersonating people. Hakuba was intrigued in the possibilities of a gadget like that.

"Who made it?" he enquired wondering whether he should get one just to annoy Kaito.

"Hakase did as well as some other ones. I'll show you another time. If you like Nakamori-san, I can get him to design one for you."

He threw a plain black mobile phone that he had been holding to Aoko.

"This is a spare phone that I have never used so They won't know about it and it should be secure. After you have used it please destroy it. Luckily you didn't have your mobile phone with you when you came. Your father's phone line is probably tapped so please be careful about what you say. Don't tell him where you are or who you are with. If you like you can do it in private."

Aoko shook her head; she was afraid that she would do it wrong and say too much which would ruin everything. She hoped that her father would be safe from Them as he was a police officer and couldn't be taken out that easily without people asking questions.

"If I give anything away please tear the phone away from me."

She carefully dialled the number of her father's private line at the police station with one hand and clutched the bowtie in the other. She looked up at the clock on the wall. He should be there at this time in the morning. He picked up after three rings and she thought she heard a faint click on the line. Conan was right; the phone was tapped. She would have to be quick so They couldn't trace her,

"Nakamori here," the Inspector growled informally sounding like his usual gruff self.

"It's me Aoko. I'm just calling to say that I'm not at Kaito's house, but I'm safe. Please don't ask any more."

"Aoko. I've been so worried. Our house was on fire last night and Kuroba-san-"

"Our house was on fire? What happened?"

At hearing that the two detectives and one magician exchanged looks. It showed that the Black Organisation weren't taking any chances with Aoko and were warning them that they would be killed.

"I wasn't at home luckily and our next-door neighbour called the Fire Department as soon as she saw the flames so the damage is...minimal. It's just your bedroom and mine. It seems to have been deliberately started upstairs, but the case has already been closed by my superiors as well as the incident at Tokyo Tower."

"Are you going to be safe?"

"I should be. They're not after me they're after you. I'm not going to ask you where you are or what you are doing in case my phone is tapped. Just stay safe and remember that I love you. Goodbye Aoko."

There was a click as Inspector Nakamori put the phone down. Aoko just stared at it as if she couldn't believe that her father was saying that she couldn't see him. Kaito plucked the phone from her frozen hand and crushed it with his foot. Hakuba and Conn looked away awkwardly not knowing what to say. Kaito hugged Aoko tightly to show that he was there for her, but didn't say anything. The only sign of emotion that Aoko showed were her clenched fists and wet eyes.

"Your father is a sensible man. It's safe for both for both of you if he doesn't know where you are," Conan said eventually.

Aoko nodded miserably not looking up at him. "I can't see him until this is over, right?"

"No you can't. Which brings me to the next topic. You need to choose a new name. Haibara and I often get visits from some of our friends from school and they are very curious and they will want to play with you too."

"Haibara-san told me about them. They like solving mysteries and call themselves the Shonen Tantei Dan," Aoko replied wiping her eyes on a flowery tissue that Kaito produced from up his sleeve along with a puff of smoke.

"I've asked Hakase to get you some new clothes. Haibara doesn't like to share her clothes as some of hers are designer. That's why you are wearing her unwanted pyjamas because she doesn't like them. Possibly because they're pink."

"I'd noticed," Aoko commented dryly. "What made you come up with a name as weird as Conan Edogawa? The Conan is obviously from Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. Edogawa? Oh, I know; the novelist Edogawa Rampo?"

"Well done. Do you have any book characters or authors that you like? Famous detectives are fine as well."

"I was reading Harry Potter before all this happened, but all the names in that are western and would sound strange. I can't imagine being called Hermione or any of the other names."

"What about Lupin?" Kaito interrupted eagerly. "There are some female characters in that."

"Don't be silly Kuroba," Hakuba broke in as well desperate for Aoko to choose a name that wasn't from a series of stories about a thief and he was unable to resist opposing Kaito. "Sherlock Holmes; there are a few female characters in that like Irene Adler."

"Shut up both of you," Aoko shouted as she was trying to think of a name and didn't want it to be anything to do with thieves or detectives. Also she was a little tired of the rivalry between Kaito and Hakuba. Sometimes it amused her, but right now it was getting on her nerves. "It's my name, I'm deciding. I want to be called Akiko after my mother."

"What about the surname?"

"I think I'll go with a name from an author to make it more interesting. Hmm, what books do I like? I don't mind Nancy Drew so... Keene after the author? Akiko Keene. "I think I'll stick with that."

"Well, we've got that out of the way," Conan said standing up and stretching his stiff limbs. He fished his mobile phone out of his pocket. "I just need to make quite a lot of phone calls. I might be a while. I think I will call Hattori first and get the easiest one out the way."

As he left the room he could hear Kaito asking Aoko why she chose a name from a detective series and she pointed out that most the of the names in Lupin were French and would be even stranger than an English one. Hakuba agreed with her just to annoy Kaito and started an argument on who was better out of Sherlock Holmes and Lupin.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was completely stuck for an alias for Aoko so what I came up with may sound a little strange. Akiko means autumn child. Nancy Drew had more than one ghost writer, but they wrote under a collective pseudonym which was Carolyn Keene. (My bookshelf of Nancy Drew books was next to my laptop when I was typing this.) I also went through a few of my Lupin books to find some normal surnames, but they were either French or sounded strange.


	9. A strange child

**Secrets and Lies: Chapter 9**

Later that day after Hakuba and Kaito's argument Professor Agasa arrived back from shopping and dumped all the bags on the sofa after a long shopping trip. Aoko was in the basement helping Haibara with her research and Kaito was feeding his doves in the front room.

Haibara briefly appeared to take the bag of alcoholic beverages to the dark depths of the basement for further study. She ordered Kaito to make her some peanut butter and blueberry jam sandwiches and told him to keep them away from Hakase as he was on a strict diet.

"Here's the clothes I bought for Nakamori-san," he said holding up a white skirt, a black pair of shorts, underwear and two plain pink t-shirts. "I also bought her a pair of Converse; I think she is the same size as Ai-kun so they should fit. By the way does she like pink? I hope she does."

"Her favourite colour is blue, but she doesn't mind pink," Kaito informed him remembering playing dressing up games with her as a child and she would always insist of wearing something blue.

_Flashback_

_"Kaito, let's play Princes and Princesses," Aoko demanded happily diving into the dressing up box full of clothes and other things that Chikage Kuroba had brought down from the attic for them to play with._

_It was a Saturday and it was the day after a Kid heist. Inspector Nakamori had dropped Aoko off at the Kurobas' house so they could look after her as he had to fill in paperwork at the police station and he couldn't find anyone else to look after her. Toichi Kuroba was having a lie in after a very late night and didn't want to be disturbed so Aoko and Kaito were banned from running amok through the entire house like they usually did. They were restricted to the front room and told to keep the noise down. To cheer them up Kaito's mother brought down some old clothes from the attic and said they could play dressing up as long as they were quiet and didn't leave the room or wreck the furniture._   
_The clothes were an odd mixture. Some were from Chikage's childhood and some were old clothes that her husband didn't wear, but wanted to keep in case of an emergency like his spare white suit and top hat._   
_Aoko came out clutching a long pale blue dress and a matching hat that Chikage had worn as a girl._

_"See, I can be the princess and you can be the prince."_

_Kaito screwed up his face and delved through the box for something that would hopefully change her mind. He found a small flat and round object with a long chain hanging from it. He was unable to work out what it was so he showed it to Aoko as she often knew random facts. She took it from him and held it up to the light. The middle of the circular part was glass and see through._

_"It's a monocular; you wear it on your eye like this," she explained, mispronouncing the word as she had only heard it said once. She placed it on his face to demonstrate, not noticing that he was blushing. "That thief that Otou-san says rude words about wears one. You know, Kaitou Kid."_

_"Oh, Kaitou Kid. I like him. He's a magician so he can't be a criminal. Ooh, there's a white suit and a top hat too. I can be Kid instead of some boring prince," Kaito said putting on the trousers and the jacket. Both were too long for him and swamped his small body._

_"Kaito, that is for an adult. You could roll up the trouser legs and sleeves. If you are going to be Kaitou Kid then who am I?"_

_Kaito thought for a second determined to keep her happy so she would forget about playing princes and princesses. "I know, you can be my wife. You can dig out the bullets like a surgeon when I get shot," Kaito suggested fantasizing about being like Kaitou Kid when he was older. "I think I saw a gun in there."_

_Aoko rifled through the clothes and spotted it along with a black hat that she stuck on her head. "Okay, run round the room and pretend you have stolen a jewel."_

_Kaito ran around the room as quietly as possible and bounced on the sofa and jumped off with his arms out pretending that he had a hang glider. Aoko cocked the gun quite low at him as it was heavy for a seven year old to hold._

_"Stick 'em up Kid. I'm from a criminal organisation that wants to hunt you down."_

_She pulled the trigger once struggling to pull it back and luckily for both of them the safety was still on. It was Toichi Kuroba's spare gun that he thought he had lost. Kaito dropped the floor and writhed around in pretend pain. Aoko discarded her hat and ran over to him pretending to cry._

_"I'm going to dig the bullet out husband. Don't scream," she ordered bending down over him._   
_"Ahhhhh! Don't scratch me."_

_Chikage Kuroba watched the two seven year olds through the partially open door. She was amused at the subject they had chosen and reminded herself to remove the gun from the box at the first opportunity. However she was a little fearful about their safety in the future too. Kaito and Aoko could be acting out their future if last night's heist had been any indication. It had been the worst so far. The Black Organisation had turned up again to threaten Kid and this time they actually started shooting at him. They were demanding that he find Pandora again when he refused they fired shots at him and one of them hit him in the arm. Jii had helped him escape by causing a diversion and when they had both arrived home she had helped Jii dig the bullet out._

_She knew that Kaito liked Aoko and they were a good match. In the future Kaito could be potentially taking Toichi's place and Aoko could be taking hers if they were both killed by the Black Organisation._

Kaito smiled fondly at the memory remembering how he wished that he was Kid and Aoko was his wife. Now he knew that his dream had come true in a way, but a little more disastrously than he had intended. He was jerked back to the present by Professor Agasa coughing and sitting down on the sofa with a newspaper that he had bought.

"That reminds me, I need to call my mother and explain everything that is going on to her," Kaito said wondering if the phone at his house had been tapped yet. It probably had been knowing the efficiency of the Black Organisation and he didn't want to take a chance and ruin everything by telling her where they all were. Then he remembered Jii; he could contact him and ask him to pass a message onto her. He could also use one of his doves to send a message, but they weren't as efficient as homing pigeons.

"Er, Kaito-kun. I don't think that you should contact her right now or anytime soon. It could put her in even more danger. There's an article here that mentions her."

Hakase folded the newspaper in half and pointed out small news article in the corner of a page towards the back. It was a local newspaper. Kaito took it from his worried and read it out loud as Conan and Hakuba entered the room together. His brain couldn't seem to process what he had just read so he read it out loud.

"Street crime is still happening today despite what the Police are telling us about lower crime figures. As proof the wife of Toichi Kuroba, the world famous magician was one of many victims today that were a victim of street crime. Chikage Kuroba was beaten by a gang of street thugs here in Tokyo who were apparently after her purse. She was taken to hospital with severe injuries and her attackers fled from the scene... The rest of the article just goes on about street crime."

"It's Them," Conan stated what they all knew.  
"They must be trying to send a message to us to warn us that they are on our trail."

"Well, we can't stop night. I think they are panicking after you three singlehandedly destroyed an entire branch of their organisation. Kuroba, please don't get tempted to visit your mother. It's most likely a trap."

"I know," Kaito answered sadly. He was like Aoko; she wouldn't be able to see her father and he wouldn't be able to see his mother. It would be hard, but they would both have to persevere. "They must know I'm helping too since they target my mother. Wait, if they have targeted my mother, are controlling Aoko's father to do nothing what about Hakuba's parents."

Hakuba jumped a little when Kaito said that. Kaito and Conan looked at him waiting for him to answer. The moment Kaito had read the article out loud his mind had jumped to his father. He wasn't worried about him. He never saw him anymore. His work as the Chief of Police kept him busy and sometimes he got a glimpse of his early in the morning leaving for work, but he didn't care about pleasing his father anymore.

"I'm going to be blunt," Conan began noticing that Hakuba seemed to be sensitive on the subject of his parents. "Do you have a mother and if so where is she? The Black Organisation are targeting anyone close to you three so we need to know."

Hakuba sighed remembering how his mother had died. It had been his father's fault and he had hated him ever since then. "No I don't have one. She died when I was very young. I have a father and a governess who is currently in England and doesn't work for my family anymore."

"I don't think your father would be targeted as he is the Chief of Police, but I don't think he could have got that far up in the ranks without hearing anything about the Black Organisation," Kaito said knowing that Hakuba would pick up what he was implying.

"He's either a member or an affiliate that passes information on. You're right Kuroba he couldn't have got that far in the Police without having something to do with the Black Organisation; they wouldn't want a Chief of Police that worked against them and investigated their cases properly. He is probably the one that closed down the Tokyo Tower investigation."  
He smiled ruefully at the look on Conan and Kaito's faces. "I don't care for him anymore. I never see him and he never pays any attention to me even if we accidentally meet at the Police Station. It's like I don't exist. I think we should investigate him first."  
"Yes, I think that would be a good idea. I think I'm going to be calling in some favours from officers I know. Excuse me," Conan replied turning on his heel and leaving the room.

Kaito patted Hakuba on the shoulder feeling sorry for him. At least he had done parent that cared for him and supported him. To have one dead and never see the other one must be terrible.

"You must get lonely at home. How's Watson? I haven't seen him recently," Kaito said trying to cheer him up.

"He is in England, but I think he's going to die soon. I've had him for a long time."

Conan flipped open his Conan Edogawa phone and scrolled through his police contacts deciding who to call. He came to Sato's number and considered the risks. Sato and Takagi were the officers that were the most likely to do something for him, but on the other hand they were the most suspicious ones. However he couldn't be picky so he decided to ask Sato. If he involved them even if it was for one small task he could be potentially endangering their lives. To give them a chance he resolved to explain everything briefly first before they agreed to anything. He couldn't call her line at work in case all the telephone lines were tapped. Luckily he had her mobile number that she had given him for emergencies. He dialled the number.

"Hello. It's Sato," she said picking up her phone after a few rings.

"Sato-keiji. It's Conan-kun. I've got a big favour to ask of you. It's very important," Conan stated trying to sound as childlike as he normally did when talking to her. The level depended on how suspicious she was.

"Oh, hello Conan-kun. Sure, I'll do you a favour. What do you want?"

"I think I had better explain it all to you first before you do anything. It might save your life."

He briefly went through all the major points about the Black Organisation leaving out all the parts about him and Haibara. He explained how they had informers in the Police and mentioned some of the cases that They had been involved in. He also told her what he needed to do.

"So you want those case reports and if anyone asks it was Kogoro Mori that requested them. I can do that. You also want to know who closed the investigation involving Kaito Kid at Tokyo Tower. That isn't really my department. I don't think I can do that. Sorry."

"Can't you persuade someone from that department to tell you? I've heard from Takagi-Keiji that you are popular with male police officers; he said that they would probably do anything for you."

"TAKAGI!"

Conan could hear Sato yelling at him in the background and hid a smile.

"All right Conan-kun, since it is important I'll do it. However I do have one condition."

He didn't like the sound of that. "What is it?"

"You will tell me how you got mixed up with a criminal organisation and you will tell me the whole truth. I'll call you when I've got the information. Bye."

She hung up before Conan could protest or reply. She put her mobile phone back into her pocket. Two very strange requests from a very strange child. She and Takagi had always known that some facts about him didn't add up. She had initially believed that he had picked up his skill from Kogoro Mori teaching him. After watching how he treated Conan she was positive that it wasn't the case. She had decided that she would go along with him and wouldn't ask questions until some new evidence about him turned up. Now she had some. He had a connection to a criminal organisation. How did a seven year old get mixed up in that?

He had also noticed that effect that she had on male police officers that she wasn't really aware of. She didn't think that Takagi had told him; it didn't fit in with his personality. He must have lied to cover himself. To top that he had suggested that she use it to her advantage. A normal seven year old wouldn't ask that. At least now she had the chance to ask him some questions.

She looked over at her idiotic partner on the desk next to her who had his head buried in paperwork. She stood up and moved next to him ignoring the stares that she had got from yelling loudly at him.

"Takagi, go down to records and request to have these case files. It's someone's request, but say Kogoro Mori if you get asked," she ordered slapping her hastily scrawled list down top of his paperwork. "Now please."

"Why do I have to do it? Why can't you? I'm busy," he whined making a face.  
Sato knew by now how to stop him protesting. She poked his chin noticing how his cheeks reddened. "He's asked me to do something else. If you do it I'll make you a bento."

She dropped her volume and whispered in his ear. "It's a request from Conan-kun. If we do it I get to ask some questions in return."

Takagi turned it over in his mind. It was very tantalising. Ever since the bombing case that had trapped him and Conan in a lift together with a bomb he had been curious as Conan had shown skill in disarming the bomb. When Takagi had asked him who he really was the boy's answer had intrigued him. It was a good opportunity to find out why he was so smart.

"Okay, I'll do it," he said standing up and leaving the office.


	10. Detective of the West

**Chapter 10: Detective of the West**

_Kogoro Mori the detective has requested a number of police files for cases that involved the Organisation and were rewritten by various agents. They are being delivered this morning._

The email to the head of the Black Organisation was brief, but very informative. It wasn't signed and the sender was untraceable, but they knew who it was from. Chief Hakuba was the Black Organisation member that held the highest rank in the Police and was the most useful as he requested facts about cases that related to the Organisation to be altered to keep the Organisation hidden for as long as possible. Within the Organisation Hakuba was Anokata's right hand man and was a valued member due to his unwavering commitment to the Organisation. Unlike Vermouth he kept to the rules and always reported what he was doing.

However it was a shame that his son Saguru Hakuba had chosen to oppose the Organisation by fighting crime and never supporting it. Young bright recruits were always wanted in the Organisation as they could be moulded into the perfect agent and controlled from an early age to become skilled and never question orders. There hadn't been any young recruits since Sherry. Their training had always worked and she had been the only that had shown signs of rebelling, but they couldn't take any more chances with her on the loose and had closed the programme down. Anokata had reviewed Sherry's work and she was indeed a brilliant chemist, but something had gone wrong. It was possibly due to a close attachment to the sister that was killed. Gin and Vermouth had been used to keep her in line and watch her, but in the end they had failed once the sister was killed and she had somehow escaped and still hadn't been caught.

Sherry, Kaito Kid, the incident at Tokyo Tower, Aoko Nakamori, Saguru Hakuba and Kaito Kuroba were the only loose ends that could lead to the discovery of the Organisation and they needed to be taken care of. Steps had been taken, but they were cautionary and meant to show the three what the Organisation was capable of. It must have not been enough as one of them or Sherry had alerted the detective Kogoro Mori to the existence of the Organisation. Mori had deep connections with the Police and had crossed them once before and needed to be stopped before he did any real damage.

Anokata reached for the phone and sent a message to his best members on the subject of Kogoro Mori.

The next morning Conan was back at the detective office after two days at Hakase's to receive the files that Sato was delivering. He had phoned Heiji and the FBI the night before and had received a reply from Sato to say that she had the files and would be dropping them off in the morning. Heiji was catching the earliest bullet train to Tokyo and said he would be arriving at the office around 11. Conan hoped that he wasn't bringing Kazuha with him as he always seemed to bring her with him and was weak against her. It reminded him of himself and Ran a little.

"Conan-kun would you like me to make you breakfast?" Ran enquired sticking her head around the door to the office.

"No thank you Ran-neechan. I've already eaten," he replied looking up from his manga magazine.

Ran was about to leave when something about Conan sitting in the office by himself made her turn back. She had noticed that he wasn't as bright as usual. He hadn't really shown any emotion since he had returned from Professor Agasa's house the day before. Something must have happened there. Why was he in the office this early anyway? Her father hadn't even woken up yet and it was a weekend.

"Conan-kun, are you waiting for something? You look a little lonely." Conan smiled as brightly as he could to stop her from worrying. "I'm waiting for Heiji-niichan to arrive. He's coming to Tokyo today."

"Hattori-kun is? Is Kazuha-chan coming too? Why didn't you tell me before? I could have arranged a day out for him. Tell you what I'll wait with you."

That was one of the most inconvenient things she could have said. Sato was arriving before Heiji to drop off the files and Ran would definitely ask what was going on. He could tell her that her father had requested them, but that was implausible as he never did any extra detective work and she would be bound to ask him about it. Also he needed to tell Sato his cover story that he had planned the night before. He had noticed that she and Takagi had been looking at him suspiciously for a while. Somehow he didn't think that telling that he would tell her when they were in the next world would suffice for a second time like he told Takagi when he asked during the bombing incident. He didn't want to tell her the truth in case she was found out by the Black Organisation and interrogated. He had made up a story that would satisfy her, but he needed to get rid of Ran first. "He said he would get here around 11," Conan informed her trying to persuade her to leave and go back upstairs.

"I'm also waiting for a manga book I ordered to be delivered so you can go back upstairs."

"Don't worry I'll keep you company. I haven't made any arrangements today anyway," Ran replied beginning to get the impression that he didn't want her there and didn't want to say it outright.

Conan sighed. Ran was too kind and selfless sometimes. It did get annoying at times. He would have to change tack.

"I also need to go buy something for school. I'll do it before he comes," he said scrambling for an excuse and ran out the door before she could reply.

Ran stared after him wondering, not for the first time if he was all he was supposed to be. Occasionally she caught him acting more mature than his age and he could read books and signs that were full of difficult kanji. He never flinched at a dead body whereas she still screamed despite the large number that she had seen. No matter how many times her father hit him over the head at a crime scene for interfering he always interrupted him and pointed clues out to him. On a few occasions she had suspected that he was Shinichi, but whenever she had been openly suspicious something always seemed to happen that disproved her theory. Now she had learnt to just keep quiet and watch him.

Conan stood outside the staircase to the detective office to wait for Sato. He caught his breath back after his quick run and mentally apologised to Ran for lying to her so much. He hated lying to her, but it was for her own good. Sato pulled up in her car a few minutes later. He had seen her speeding all the way down the street. It was surprising that she never crashed into anything. He waved at her and she smiled back. She got out her car clutching a neatly wrapped parcel.

"Good morning Conan-kun. I've got the files you asked for. Takagi is covering for me at the station so we will have to be as quick as possible."

Conan nodded his eyes fixed on the parcel. He had prepared what he was going to say to her and had some evidence at hand in case she wanted proof. All he could do now was hope that she believed him.  

"Shall we go up to the office and discuss it?" she suggested noting that his eyes were fixed on what she was carrying.

"No, Ran-neechan is there. Let's sit in your car," he replied opening to door and sitting in the front passenger seat.

Sato shrugged and followed. "Remember our deal. Files for information. Why are you mixed up in all of this?" Sato started, closing her car door and sitting down in the driver's seat.

Conan took a deep breath and launched into his story. "My mother is American and works for the CIA. She was undercover in the organisation that I told you about until they discovered she was a spy a few years ago. She managed to escape, but they killed my father in revenge. I was sent to live in Japan for my own safety and nothing has really happened until last year when my mother got in contact and told me that she needed my help in getting information about them as it couldn't be an official investigation otherwise they would find out."

Sato was silent for a minute to absorb what she had just been told. If his mother was American why didn't he look more foreign? Why did he end up living with the Kogoro Mori? There were a few things that didn't make sense.

"Why are so clever and observant?"

"I was trained by my parents to be observant and I have read a lot of books," Conan replied calmly having anticipated the questions she was most likely to ask.

"Can you actually prove that what you have just told me is true?"

"Yes, Takagi has met my mother. She is known to him as Jodie Santemillion," Conan said confidently.

In his call to Jodie Starling the night before he had explained that he might need her to pretend to be his mother so she was nearby,

"So she's the foreigner that Takagi sometimes mentions and does impressions of. May I meet her?" Sato asked remembering Takagi talking about her and wondering whether she really was his mother.

Conan checked the time on his watch. Only half an hour until Hattori was due to arrive. Luckily he was already prepared for this question. At his instruction Jodie was a few streets away.

"Sure, I'll call her," he answered ringing her number on his phone. "It's what we discussed," he said once she had picked her phone up.

Then he hung up once she had replied with an affirmative. "She will be about five minutes. I asked her yesterday if it was okay to tell you and she said yes as long as you could be trusted."

In the five minutes Sato mulled over the story and tried to work out whether some of what he was telling her was true or was it all just a lie. She did trust him and she wondered if he was lying to protect her. It would be like him; she had seen how he behaved towards Ran.

Conan, on the other hand was worrying over the three fugitives hiding at Hakase's and the production of the antidote as well as Black Organisation spies. They could be anywhere. Also he needed to deal with a suspicious Ran, but now was not the time. He spotted Jodie in the rear view mirror walking down the street. He opened his door and waved as she walked past. She waved back and opened one of back doors and got in.

"You wanted to meet me, yes?"

"I did. So you are a member of the CIA and Conan, your son is helping you investigate this organisation." Jodie reached over the front and patted Conan on the head in what she hoped was a motherly way. Conan scowled, acting his part. "He's such a great help to me and no one ever suspects him."

Sato tapped the steering wheel, thinking of what to say. "All right. For now Conan-kun I will believe you and ignore the obvious inconsistencies in your story. If you ever bring down this organisation then you will have to tell me the real truth."

"But," Conan was about to protest, then he realised it was futile. He shouldn't have expected an intelligent police officer to swallow a story like that. "I will."

"I look forward to it. The name of the police officer that closed the case you asked me about is written on a piece of paper in the bow," Sato said handing the parcel over to Conan. "Good bye."

Conan and Jodie took the hint and got out the car. They waved goodbye as Sato sped off leaving a trail of exhaust fumes behind her. Jodie turned to Conan.

"That was fun. So Cool Kid, you're trying to bring Them down by yourself?"

"Yes, I've got some help though," Conan answered thinking of the people that he had got to know in the past few days as an indirect result of the Black Organisation.

"There is another thing that I wanted to ask you. Have you heard from Kir recently?"

"Actually there was a short message from her yesterday saying that all missions within in the Organisation have been suspended and everyone now has a new objective."

Conan's blood ran cold. He could guess what that new objective was if the attack on Kuroba's mother was anything to go by. "The objective is?"

"To kill three teenagers that know too much. Her message was very short which is not surprising considering the danger she is."

"Can you tell me the next time she contacts please? It's very important."

"I will. If you need any help with what you are doing feel free to call me. I wouldn't mind having to act as your mother again," Jodie said winking and walking away. "You've befriended those three, haven't you? Keep safe."

Conan watched her leave. So the objective now was to kill rather than warn now. Good. It showed that getting hold of those files had worried Them. So they must be getting somewhere in their investigation. He was itching to open the parcel and see what the name was, but he wanted Heiji to arrive before so they could go to Hakase's and open it there. He checked his watch. It was nearly 11. Where was he? He didn't notice a taxi pull up a little way down the street and two Osakans get out.

"Hey Ku-Conan-kun," greeted a male voice behind him with a strong Kansai accent. "What are ya doin' out here? I though ya would be inside with ya neechan."

"Hattori," Conan said turning around ready to retort.

Then he stopped as he noticed who was standing next to him. Of course. He had brought Kazuha with him. Well, it would keep Ran happy and distracted.

"So you've brought you girlfriend with you," he said quietly so only Hattori would hear. Hattori made a face and bonked him on the head.

* * *

 

**To make this fanfic less complicated for me to write Sera Masumi will not be included as it has not yet been made clear in the manga what the purpose of her character is. (This fanfiction was originally written in 2011)**

**One theory is that she is Akai's sister. (There are lots of theories going around on the Detective Conan Translation Project forums)**


	11. Like father like son

**Secrets and Lies: Chapter 11**

The detective, magician and seven year old child that were sitting in the front room of 2-22 Beika all looked up in surprise as Conan led an arguing Osakan carrying a parcel through front door. Conan looked tired as if he had to deal with him for the entire journey from the detective office.

"For the last time Kazuha ain't my girlfriend," he yelled as Conan closed the door behind him. He stopped shouting when he caught sight of Hakuba sitting primly in an armchair smirking at him.

Heiji placed the parcel on the floor and turned on Conan. "Oi Kudo, ya never mentioned that I was gonna be workin' with that snobby blonde. Last time was bad enough."

Kaito and Aoko fought back laughs at this. They could see why the two didn't get on now; the two detectives were polar opposites to each other. Conan sighed. He shouldn't have expected them to act better toward each other on their second meeting. Hopefully the two would resolve their differences at some point; they were going to be cooped up together for a while. For everyone's sake the sooner the better otherwise he didn't think he could take the arguments.

"Hattori, calm down," he said steering him towards Kaito and Aoko who he thought might work with him better. "Let me introduce you to Kaito Kuroba, he's-"

"-A classmate of Hakuba," Kaito cut off Conan smoothly. He had a feeling that if Heiji Hattori didn't want to work with Hakuba who was a fellow teenage detective then he would want to work with Kaitoi Kid, a criminal less. "I'm a magician."

He held his hand to him to shake. Heiji eyed his hand suspiciously and refused. Someone had tried something similar on him and he had received an electric shock.

"Ya holding out ya hand a little strangely. I'm guessing ya holdin' a device that would give me an electric shock. That's an old trick."

Kaito raised his eyebrows. Hattori was good as expected. He could see why Hakuba had suggested working with him even though they didn't get on. However Hattori hadn't deduced the entire trick.

"You're right; that trick is old, I do a different version instead. There's actually a very sticky substance in my hand that will stick to anything that touches it. It's impossible to get off without the right chemical."

"What chemical is that?"

"The enzyme in your saliva; Amylase," Kaito answered with a wink spitting into his hand and wiping the goo off with a tissue.

Aoko screwed up her face in disgust and Hakuba just rolled his eyes.

"It was worth a try. I probably shouldn't do any more magic tricks with so many detectives around."

"Kaito, that is disgusting," Aoko complained moving away from him.

"And who are ya?" Heiji asked moving his eyes to rest on her. Why was there a seven year old? She didn't seem to be the detective type.

"I'm Aoko Nakamori."

"So ya old man is Inspector Nakamori; the guy that can't catch Kid. Strange. I thought his daughter was the same age as me."

"I was until a few days ago," Aoko informed his tartly, annoyed at the way he described her father. "I'm in the same boat as Shinichi Kudo now."

Hakuba noticed that glares Aoko was giving Hattori and decided to interrupt before he upset Aoko any further.

"Kudo-kun, is that parcel the files from the police? By the way, it is nice to see you again Hattori-kun. I see you are hot blooded as usual."

"Yes. I got them this morning," Conan answered hurriedly before Heiji could retort and start something again.

He was going to have to keep the two apart for now. Hakuba and Kaito were bad enough together, but at least Kaito didn't argue as loudly as Heiji did.

"The name of the officer that closed the Tokyo Tower case is apparently written on a piece of paper in the box."

He untied the string and unwrapped the brown paper. Inside was a cardboard box. He unpicked the tape that was sealing it with his fingernail. As Sato had promised there was a piece of paper lying on top of the files. He drew it out and read the name. It was what he had expected. Conan looked over at Hakuba awkwardly. He didn't know what to say. How was he going to explain it? Kaito saw the glance and understood. Heiji on the other hand looked puzzled at the expression on Conan's face.

"What's the name then Kudo?" Conan was silent and kept his eyes fixed on the floor.

"It's my father; Chief Hakuba, isn't it?" Hakuba said calmly, comprehending the awkward silence. He had known it was going to be somehow despite what he had told himself.

"Yes."

"I knew it. Anyway lets all take some files each and look for connections," Hakuba said getting up and reaching for the box.

"Where's the evil scientist?" Heiji asked looking around the room nervously. He was glad that she wasn't there to glare at him; she gave him the creeps no matter how many times Kudo had tried to reassure him that she could be friendly.

"Basement," everyone chorused in unison. That morning Haibara had disappeared off to the basement demanding that no one was allowed disturb her. She had eaten a breakfast of peanut butter and blueberry jam sandwiches and had taken the jars with her. Apparently she was making some progress with the antidote so she wanted to be alone.

Meanwhile Ran and Kazuha were sitting in the detective office working out what they were going to for that day. They were thinking of going shopping in Shibuya or going to Tropical Land together. Ran had completely forgotten about Conan with Kazuha there. They hadn't seen each other in a while so they were having fun catching up and gossiping.

"Have you confessed to Hattori-kun yet?" Ran asked her knowing that she wouldn't have to worry about her father hearing as he was busy snoring with his head on his desk.

"Not yet. The last time I did he ran off somewhere before I got a chance," Kazuha admitted remembering how red her face had been and she was happy that she hadn't jeopardised their friendship by confessing yet.

There was a knock at the door and Ran could see two silhouettes through the glass pane of the door. She rushed over to her father and shook him to wake him up.

"Wipe that drool off your face. There are some clients at the door. Oh dear, you didn't shave this morning and your breath smells of alcohol. You're a mess."

Kogoro Mori rubbed his bleary eyes and took the handkerchief that Ran held out to him and rubbed the drool off his face. He had drunk as few too many beers the previous night and had a pounding headache and didn't appreciate her criticism of his appearance.

"Come in," he called clearing his throat and sitting up.

The door was opened to reveal two men dressed in black. One was wearing a trench coat with a hat jammed low on his head and had flowing silvery blonde hair. All that could be seen of his eyes were slits. The other man was shorter and stouter than his partner and had a hat and black sunglasses.

Ran gasped involuntarily. She knew she had seen them before; she just couldn't place the memory. After some thought it came to her. Tropical Land. The Rollercoaster Murder Case. Shinichi. The two men had been suspects in the murder. Later that day after the murder had been solved and she had been walking out the theme park with Shinichi she had caught a glimpse of the shorter one with sunglasses skulking around suspiciously. Shinichi must have spotted him too because a second later he had made an excuse and had run off in the same direction. She didn't see him again for a long time after that and whenever she had he always seemed to disappear suddenly. Were the two men connected to the case that Shinichi was supposed to be investigating? If so why were they here?

Gin heard her gasp and eyed her suspiciously. He had seen her photo in the case file he had been given an hour ago. Ran Mori. The daughter of Kogoro Mori and an undefeatable Karate champion. He would have to watch her carefully in case she presented a threat. He noticed the girl standing next to her. Who was she? Well whoever she was she was an extra person to deal with and wasn't required for the mission. That was the trouble with hastily planned operations; there was never enough time to collect information about the planned target. There had only been enough time to read a few files and decided who was going to carry it out.

"Do you have a case for me to solve?" Kogoro Mori asked yawning after a minute of silence.

Gin drew his pistol out and pointed it at him. It looked like the great detective wasn't that clever in the morning. He just stared at the gun not quite comprehending the danger he was in. Ran and Kazuha shrank back in fear before remembering their training and lowering themselves into martial art stances. Gin noticed this and smirked. He raised his gun and fired off a shot at the ceiling.

Ran and Kazuha straightened and glared at him instead.

"No tricks."

"W-what do you want?" "I want answers," he said and fired two shots.

Hakuba sipped a cup of Earl Grey tea with lemon daintily whilst the others drank green tea and ate a snack of rice crackers. They had all stopped for a break and all of their eyes were beginning to feel the strain of reading so much.

"So now we have learnt that the case reports don't match Kudo-kun's accounts of what he told the police at the time. They must have been rewritten to omit any mentions of the Black Organisation. And we also now know that my father is definitely involved," Hakuba summarised without any emotion in his voice.

"Can't you plant listening devices on your father or in his office," Kaito suggested.

"Ha. I haven't seen him properly in about a month and all the household staff worship him. Besides if he saw he would probably shoot me on the spot now," he answered bitterly and tried to change the subject. "At least we know what the common factors in all the cases are now. Hattori-kun?"

"Yes, I've been payin' attention. Large amounts of money, science, computer programming and they seem to like young talent," Heiji ticked all of them off on his fingers. "Did ya father ever hint to ya about joinin'?"

Hakuba thought about it. "Hmm... Once we were eating dinner together once and he started talking about how crime was necessary for progress and that no one was perfect. I argued against his view and he never spoke of it again. Come to think of it I started seeing him less often after that conversation. He was probably testing me."

Aoko felt sorry for him. He had been rejected by his father just because he was against crime. She walked over and offered him a rice cracker to distract him. Hakuba refused politely, but was grateful for her kindness. The shrill ring of Conan's mobile phone caused them all to jump. The dove Kaito was feeding was scared and bit him on the finger. Conan swallowed his rice cracker and dug the phone out of his pocket. It was Jodie Starling's number. Putting his teacup down on the floor he pressed the green phone icon to answer. Jodie began speaking immediately.

"Cool Kid. It's urgent. I've just got another message from Kir." Her voice was rushed and out of breath.

"What was it?"

"Five agents including her have been given the task of kidnapping Kogoro Mori. It was decided between them that two agents called Gin and Vodka should do it. If you are there please get Ran-kun and Mori-san away quickly."

"I'm not there. Thanks Jodie." Conan put the phone down, not bothering to wait for her reply. Ran... It was probably too late to do anything, but that didn't stop him from trying.

"Damn it. Hattori you need to come with me now. I'll explain on the way. It's urgent," he ordered, running to get his shoes.


	12. Pursuit

**Secrets and Lies: Chapter 12**

The street that the Mori Detective Office resided was filled with vehicles all clustered around the office like flies around a light. There was an ambulance, a fire engine and several other cars. Heiji and Conan added to the traffic jam by pulling up in a taxi. Conan had briefed Heiji on the way there and had warned him not to get too emotional as he had learnt himself that emotions can cloud your judgement.

Heiji was very concerned about Kazuha's safety and Conan was worried about Ran. If the Black Organisation only wanted to kidnap Kogoro Mori, what would Gin and Vodka be ordered to do with the extra baggage? Somehow he couldn't see Gin dragging the old man off blindfolded and leaving the two girls behind to call the Police. Or if he left them behind he would probably torch the place which might have actually happened as the fire department were present. Conan was prepared for the worst news possible.

As they approached the agency they could see Jodie Starling standing by the entrance to the cafe talking to a man dressed in black protective clothing with reflective stripes. Presumably a fireman, Conan thought to himself. The two detectives ran over to her, ready to hear the all the details of what had happened even if it meant hearing that the people that they cared about were dead. Heiji swore to himself that if Kazuha was indeed dead as he feared that he wouldn't rest until he hunted down her killer despite how dangerous it would be.

"Did you get here in time?" Conan questioned her with a pit of dread boiling in his stomach.

Jodie shook her head slowly, she had rushed some agents over there and had broken speed limits, but they still hadn't got there in time. "By the time we arrived here They had gone. And the office was on fire, presumably to eradicate evidence."

"D-did They leave anyone behind? The target was Kogoro Mori so taking the girls wouldn't have been necessary."

Jodie brightened slightly and then she remembered that state which they had found the office in and her brief smile faded. "The Organisation took Kogoro Mori and Ran-kun. We have a witness statement saying that the two were seen being dragged into a van by two men in black. The van was black and unmarked."

"So Kazuha was left behind," Heiji said feeling a little happier despite the obvious implications of Kogoro Mori being in the hands of Black Organisation. "Can I see her?"

Conan saw the look that had briefly flashed on Jodie's face, he knew what she was about to say. They wouldn't have left Kazuha behind unless They were sure she couldn't tell anyone what she saw and the office had been set on fire.

"I'm afraid Toyama-san was shot. One bullet hit her leg and the other shot seems to have missed its target and it hit her gut. After she was shot the office was torched probably to get rid of her body and erase any evidence. Toyama-san managed to crawl to the phone and call the fire department. She was found collapsed next to the open window when they arrived. A remarkable and brave girl."

"Where is she?" Heiji demanded vowing that if she actually had lived then he would tell her that he liked her. He couldn't deny it anymore.

"She's in the ambulance, it's not a pretty sight. She was lying in a pool of her own blood when she was found. The ambulance is about to leave for the hospital. I'll tell them that you are allowed to ride with her to the hospital."

Jodie patted him on the back and they walked of together leaving Conan behind to worry about Ran's fate and the Black Organisation. She had probably been taken for leverage to get Kogoro Mori to tell the truth. That meant she would be kept alive until the old man talked which wouldn't be much as he didn't know anything about the Black Organisation. What would happen after they realised he didn't know anything? Ran and Kogoro Mori were most likely to be killed and their bodies would be efficiently disposed of. What would happen after that? The people around the Mori family would be investigated in detail. His wife would probably come under suspicion as well as him and Hattori. He would have to warn Eri Kisaki and explain to Hattori. Things were getting dangerous and complicated.

Damn it, it was all his fault. He hadn't expected the Black Organisation to move that fast. They didn't seem to want to stay in the shadows so much now as they had been seen and Kazuha was still alive. If that was true then They were getting desperate and would hopefully start making more mistakes that would lead him to Them. His fists were clenched in anger at his own stupidity and at the Black Organisation. If he ever found Ran alive he swore that he would tell her the truth about everything. If he ever found her alive.

The ambulance pulled away with its siren blaring and sped down the road to the nearest hospital. Conan prayed that Kazuha was still alive and fighting too. She had been brave and deserved to live. Maybe Hattori would finally realise his feelings and confess to her. He had a feeling that it would happen by the way that he had run off. It would at the very least cheer both of them up, but right now his priority was Ran and her father. He had to find them as soon as possible. He didn't know how he was going to do it, but he had to.

A shadow of a plan came to him and he grasped desperately at it; it wasn't up to his usual standard. Nevertheless he had to do something. Anything.

He spotted out the corner of his eye that Jodie was walking back towards him. He ran up to her and hoped that he wasn't too late to save her again.

"Jodie-san, how long has it been since the kidnappers left?"

Jodie consulted her notebook for the times. "Well, Toyama-san called the Fire Department at 3:24 which was at least five minutes after They left and that was just over half an hour ago."

"Do you know what the registration of the van is? And which way did it go?"

Jodie flipped forward a few more pages to the witness statement from a customer that had been looking out the window of the café. She couldn't see how he was planning to follow them as so much time had elapsed. It wasn't like he had a helicopter or anything with an aerial view. Then she got it. Hang glider. Kid. "It is 46-62 and it left in that direction," she informed him pointing. "By the way there is a major road closed in that direction and there is only one diversion route. I hear that it is completely blocked with cars and the traffic is moving very slowly."

Conan-kun caught her hint and knew that she must have guessed what he was planning. The bad traffic was his first real piece of luck that day.

"Thanks," he said running off to somewhere quieter so he could make a private phone call.

"Good luck Cool Kid," she called after him.

Once he had found a relatively quiet place he dialled the number for the landline of Hakase's house. He hoped that he could persuade Kuroba to endanger his life for his sake. It was a lot to ask.

"Hello. Agasa residence," said what sounded like Hakase's voice. However Conan wasn't fooled.

"I know it's you Kuroba. I need your help; it's urgent and I'm desperate. Can you use your hang glider to follow a black van with the registration 46-62? It's headed west. Put a disguise on and I'll give you more information once you're out."

"I'll have to ask Jii to meet me and give me my hang glider as soon as possible. I don't have it with me at the moment."

* * *

An hour later after being stuck in the traffic jam and going through a vehicle swap the kidnappers parked in front of an abandoned warehouse in the middle of the city. Their only real mishaps so far were getting stuck in traffic and the Mori girl had nearly escaped. Luckily for them she had been subdued with a stun gun.

Kogoro Mori still had a slight headache from his hangover and couldn't quite comprehend what had happened to him. He had been kidnapped by two men in black that he had never seen before and they had shot Ran's friend and torched the office. He knew he was dealing with something serious; he just wished he knew why they wanted him and Ran.

Ran's mind when she had been conscious had been worrying about Kazuha. The man with the long hair had shot her twice and left her in a pool of blood after saying she wasn't needed. She had been forced to watch as Kazuha writhed in pain and the other man began pouring petrol everywhere. After that they had been blindfolded and thrown into a van. Ran had begged them to save Kazuha, but all the people in the back of the van had laughed at her and had blown smoke in her face. When the van had stopped and she was lead out she had blindly kicked and tried to attack the person dragging her blindfolded. She had managed to knock the person to the ground and run a few metres before she was knocked out by someone coming up behind her with a stun gun.

Once the van had parked the two prisoners were taken out the van; Kogoro Mori was lead along with a gun pointed in his back whilst Ran was carried. The interior of the warehouse was completely bare aside from a few metal chairs, a handful of knives and guns and plastic sheeting. The male prisoner was sat on a chair and his handcuffs were unlocked and put on again in order to secure him to the chair. Ran on the other hand was unceremoniously dumped on the floor giving her bruises. She was still unconscious.

When Kogoro Mori's blindfold was whipped off he blinked several times and found himself face to face with his long haired kidnapper. Behind him he could see a woman with a sadistic smile and long blonde hair and a woman that had been introduced to him a while ago as Rena Mizunashi.

* * *

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm going to make Okiya Bourbon because it serves the story better even though I personally think that Okiya is Akai and the Akai with a scar is Bourbon.
> 
> (This was originally written in 2011)


	13. 5 Squared Makes 25

**Secrets and Lies: Chapter 13**

Attired in white and breathing hard Kaito landed on top of a tree gracefully and silently without injuring himself. He deactivated the hang glider and climbed down and stopped at the bottom to catch his breath. It had been an action packed hour. It was worse than the time he had gone on a date with Aoko at Tropical Land and had to do a heist in forty minutes and return before she suspected anything.

He had called Jii and ordered him to meet him outside Beika Hotel which was just the right height for him to take off from. He had also asked for his spare hang glider that he kept at Jii's house in case of an emergency which this certainly counted as. After he had grabbed his hang glider and taken off he had had to fight against the wind to find the traffic jam that Kudo had said the Black Organisation van would be caught up in. He had eventually managed to track down the van after flying over a few times. He had found it just in time to see it turn off to the right and into a lay-by. He had double checked the registration with his binoculars just in case he was mistaken.

He hadn't been seen by any of the cars yet as all the drivers were concentrating on the road rather than looking up at the sky. Even if people did look up he had hoped that they would mistake him for a very large white bird. He had known that if any Black Organisation members looked up they would not jump to that conclusion so he was being as careful as he could.

In the lay-by there had been another van of the same model waiting, but that one had been white and empty. He had watched as the two people in the front got out the first van, walked round and opened the back doors. Both had been wearing black and hats, but he had observed that one was a woman with dark hair. The other he hadn't been so sure about. The person had long light coloured hair, but their figure had been more masculine. Kaito had known that he had definitely found the right vehicle due to the ominous feeling that they two people gave off and by their dark attire.

Two men had jumped out the back and had dragged out the detective and Ran Mori. He hadn't been sure what he should do when Ran had nearly escaped. Kudo had told him to watch and follow rather than interfere. When the two prisoners had been transferred into the other van another women with long blonde hair had got out the first van and slowly walked over whilst smoking a cigarette. She had looked up once and Kaito was afraid that she had spotted him, but she had looked down again smirking. One of the men had shouted at her and she picked up the pace and got in the back. The van had the driven off. Kaito had realised that he had seen a skilful 2 minute vehicle swap which had been done so they couldn't be traced by their vehicle. It had been lucky that he was there.

He had followed the van from the air until it reached the warehouse. Now he was unsure what to do. If they shot the prisoners, would he be blamed for not doing anything to save them? If he went rushing in now they would be shot anyway along with him and no one would know what had happened or where he was. If he let Ran die would Kudo be angry at him? Calm down, he told himself. He was getting too worked up and worried. He should probably just collect information and tell Kudo where he was for the moment rather than plan a rescue.

Kaito was sure that the women with long blonde hair that he had seen smoking was Vermouth, the women that had fed Aoko APTX 4869. Conan had described her and shown him a picture of her as Chris Vineyard, the famous actress which was apparently quite close to her real face. That left the question of who the other four were. The other woman must be the CIA mole Kir. Kudo had also told him about a pair that always went round together and were called Gin and Vodka. Apparently Gin was tall and had long silvery blonde hair and Vodka was shorter and always wore sunglasses even in the dark. So the other man must be someone that Kudo didn't know about.

He pulled out his mobile phone from his pocket and called Kudo to tell him what was going on and to ask what he should do.

* * *

"So Nemuri no Kogoro, what do you know about the Organisation? Who have you told?" Gin questioned lighting up a cigarette.

He was sitting in a chair opposite his prisoner. The daughter was lying unconscious on the floor with her handcuffs still on and was being watched by a nervous and armed Kir. Vermouth was behind Gin and Vodka was standing by the entrance and the other Black Organisation member was patrolling outside.

Kogoro blinked and spoke slowly. "Organisation?"

"Don't play dumb. It won't help you or your daughter."

Kogoro really didn't have a clue what was going on. The people that had kidnapped him and Ran were obviously well prepared, armed and willing to kill. The killing of Ran's friend proved that. He didn't have any idea who they were though. He hadn't run up any serious gambling debts recently so that ruled out the possibility of them being violent bailiffs. According to them he was supposed to know who they were, but he didn't know a thing. And what was Rena Mizunashi doing there?

He would have to convince them that he was telling the truth so they would realise that they had made a mistake and would hopefully let him and Ran go. He looked at his captor in the eye with an unwavering gaze. "I have never heard of "The Organisation" before this. You must have mistaken me for someone else. Please let my daughter and I go."

Gin dismissed his denial instantly. Of course the detective wouldn't confess without being coerced. He stamped out his cigarette with his heel. Maybe a different question would work.

"How's Sherry?"

Kogoro blinked again, puzzled. Sherry? What was this man talking about now? First something about an organisation and now alcohol. At least that was a question he could answer.

"I prefer drinking beer and whisky to Sherry."

Gin ignored his answer again. He nodded to Vodka who stepped forward and punched the prisoner in the gut. Kogoro groaned and slumped forward in the chair.

"Don't pretend to be ignorant. Some of your cases have involved us. You can't deny that you know about us. For example you tracked down a computer programmer called Suguru Itakura and stole that programme that he was working on for us and tried to trap one of our agents into leaving his fingerprints and taking it with him so you could track us. It's undeniable. You had the necessary information. At the crime scene where he was killed by an unrelated person a disk containing his diary was copied and never appeared again. You took it and found out about what he was doing," Gin said. He was tired of denials and wanted to cut to the chase and get it over with as soon as possible. "Speak now and we'll spare your daughter. Clam up and she'll die a painful death."

Kogoro was frustrated. He really didn't know a thing. He knew that he didn't remember many of his cases so the man could be telling the truth about him solving cases that involved his organisation. At most crime scenes he always felt a sharp pricking in his neck and the next thing he knew he was being congratulated on another brilliant deduction. However he did remember a part of the case in question, but he didn't remember solving the murder case.

"I only remember tracking Itakura down. I don't remember much after finding his body."

"So you're saying that you are called Nemuri no Kogoro because you actually sleep and solve this case in your sleep?" Gin asked sceptically whilst lighting another cigarette. Was the man actually dumb enough to think that he would believe something like that? He needed to test him. "If X is equal to 25 and Y² makes X how many values can Y have?"

"Uh, 5² makes 25?"

Gin put out his cigarette and sat up straight. "Am I left handed or right handed?"

"I don't know."

"What is a Pascal?"

"Isn't it a magazine about television?

Gin knew that he had asked enough questions. He knew how to separate a lucky idiot from a smart detective. Even a ten year old should be able to work out that -5² makes 25 as well as the obvious 5². A good detective must also be observant and a good observer would have noted what hand he used the most. He raised his voice so that everyone in the warehouse could hear. "He doesn't know a thing."

Kogoro's shoulders sagged in relief. Now that this man knew he was telling the truth he and Ran might be able to get out with their lives intact.

"Ladies and gentlemen, this man couldn't deduct his way out of a paper bag. Someone else is solving these cases for him as well as using his name." Gin switched his attention back to Kogoro. "Do you feel anything just before you go to sleep? Like a prick for instance?"

"Yes, normally there is a sharp pain in my neck."

"As I thought. Is there a person that is with you every time you do a Nemuri no Kogoro?"

"Come to think of it, my daughter is and that pesky freeloader Conan is always pestering me at crime scenes."

Gin smiled in satisfaction, he had got what he wanted. It had been a good interrogation. "Wake the girl up," he ordered, standing up. He whirled around suddenly. He hated having to work with Vermouth; she never really did anything besides make sarcastic comments and annoy him. However during this operation she had been oddly quiet and distracted. It could have been the fear that they had all being feeling, that the end of Black Organisation was coming, but he didn't think that she would show it if she felt that fear. No, it was something else. She hadn't made a single snarky comment yet and she seemed nervous. He remembered that she had also been like that too when Chianti had been just about to shoot Kogoro Mori. There was definitely a connection between them that he wasn't aware of. He decided to test his theory.

"Vermouth, you haven't done anything yet. You can kill the detective. We've got all the information that we need from him anyway," he suggested, observing her reaction closely. "It's our orders from that person. Remember? You could kill him slowly like that girl I shot and left dying in the fire. It's more fun that way." Gin took his gun out its holster and held it out to her in his hand. She blanched away slightly and there was a strange look in her eyes.

"Shouldn't we verify that what he is saying is true before we do anything hasty?" Vermouth replied as calmly as she could whilst lighting a cigarette with a barely discernable shaking hand. "You can't get anything out of him once he is on the other side."

Gin shrugged, acting unconcernedly. "Why bother? We have got two names out of him and he had never heard of us before. We can interrogate his daughter next. She seems a more likely suspect than her father anyway. She could have used his name easily and she is almost the same age as Sherry."

"I think we should ask him for information about his daughter and this Conan person. Besides we can use him for leverage when we are questioning his daughter," Vermouth said walking over and sitting in his chair. She crossed her legs and took a long drag from her cigarette. She had to act natural so Gin wouldn't suspect anything. If she didn't he would kill her.

* * *


	14. Chapter 14: Three Options

Vermouth knew that she needed to play for time. Kogoro Mori wasn't exactly necessary to her Silver Bullet anymore if he really was as close as he seemed to be to bringing down the Organisation, but he still would care if he was killed. She knew that he hated people being killed. She would stop them killing Kogoro Mori for as long as she could, but she wasn't going to stick her neck out for him. She knew that Gin was suspicious.

She had looked up when they had been changing vehicles and had noticed that Kaito Kid had been following them. Kid must have been told by her Silver Bullet to inform him where they were so he could rescue the people close to him. She hoped he had a good plan. All she could do at the moment was delay the killings. She couldn't bring down the Organisation by herself, she had attempted to a month ago and it hadn't worked.

What would Gin do now if he found put that a little boy called Conan Edogawa was knocking out Kogoro Mori and solving his cases? Vermouth asked herself to try and predict the flow of events. He would probably try to track him down immediately and kidnap him. Where would be the first place he looked? 2-22 Beika presumably. He wouldn't work out that he was actually Shinichi Kudo until later. Hiroshi Agasa's name and address had been noted as a likely secondary location if the targets hadn't been at the detective office. She hoped that Kid was listening so that he could warn her Silver Bullet and get everyone out the house. That way she could direct the conversation to Conan Edogawa safely to delay things.

"Mori-san," she greeted politely. "I'm sorry for that man's boorish manners. Just answer some questions truthfully for me and neither your daughter or you will be hurt. Are you prepared to do that?"

"Yes."

"Who is Conan?"

"He is a pest of a little boy that is living with is at the moment as his parents are in America. I think he is either 7 or 8 years old."

"What is his surname?"

"Edogawa."

"Anything else you would like to add?"

"The things that he point out at crime scenes are often key to solving the case and come up in my deductions. I have to watch the new reports afterwards to find out what I did."

Gin had enough watching her and interrupted. "I think that's enough now Vermouth. It's my turn now. We can move onto the daughter now and ask her some questions about her lodger."

* * *

Conan stared at the map pensively. In one of his phone calls Kuroba had given a detailed description of his location and the route that he took and Conan had been able to pinpoint it exactly on the map. He had informed Jodie and she had organised a team of FBI agents including herself to target the warehouse, rescue the prisoners and hopefully arrest the members of the Black Organisation that were present. The only trouble appeared to be actually getting to the warehouse. The traffic situation hadn't improved and he had been stuck in Jodie's car in a traffic jam for 20 minutes and they still hadn't moved. Now his seemingly good luck that had enabled him to track them was now working against him. The outlook wasn't good; the chances were that if they ever got out of the traffic jam and to the warehouse Ran and her father would be dead and the Black Organisation members would have disappeared without a trace. He had to do something.

He dialled Kuroba's number to see if anything major had happened since he last called which had been five minutes ago. A lot of bad things can happen in five minutes and he was very worried and his nerves were beginning to fray.

"Anything happened?"

"I'm afraid so. They have just realised that Kogoro Mori doesn't know anything and it's either you or Ran that does. How far away are you?"

"Around half an hour. We're still stuck in traffic."

"Hurry up. Oops, gotta go. The guard is coming near again."

Conan hung up too and placed his phone on his knee. He sighed and looked over at Jodie. Her face was staring ahead out the window with a ferocious and angry expression on it. He had told her that Vermouth was present and she was getting psyched up to get revenge for her dead father.

"Is there nothing we can do to get out of this traffic jam?" he enquired, attempting to sound calm and professional rather than desperate like he was.

"There are a few options," she answered coming out of her reverie and turned in her seat to talk to him. She held one finger up. "One, we wait for the traffic to move."

Conan made a face and shook his head. He couldn't stand to wait while Ran could be dying and they could be stuck in traffic for ages.

She held up another finger. "Two, we get out and run all the way there."

"That could be a possibility, but we would all be tired and exhausted by the time we got there."

Another finger. "Three, we get out and see what is holding the traffic up and we will see if we can do anything about it."

Conan considered the last two. He intensely disliked the idea of running there as it would minimise everyone's efficiency and energy. He didn't like the idea of waiting in the car for the traffic to move either. That only left the third option.

* * *

Heiji gripped Kazuha's hand in the back of the ambulance. He noticed how cold it was and frowned. Kazuha had stopped writhing in pain now and had become silent and unmoving like a corpse on a mortuary slab. Like a dead person. Her pulse was slower and weaker now and to Heiji it felt like her life and spirit were slowly fading away and leaving him. When she had been wake she hadn't been aware that he was holding her hand and kept screaming about seeing things that weren't there. It was understandable as he had been frightened and alone in the fire.

The paramedics had assured Heiji that she would be fine once she had surgery and had rested and her body had shut down to preserve energy. An emergency blood transfusion had been done to sustain her and keep her alive, but they were all aware that she had lost a lot of blood and inhaled a large amount of smoke.

She was lucky to still be alive. The Black Organisation must have expected her to die from her shot wounds or from the fire. Heiji swore that he would get revenge for her. Murderous bastards, he thought to himself as the ambulance turned into the hospital.

He took out his phone and undid the lucky charm that Kazuha had made for him and placed it in her cold hand. It had saved his life before and he prayed that it would do the same for her. She had earned it. He bent down and kissed her pale forehead.

"I love ya by the way. Keep fightin'."

* * *

He drew away from her and the back doors to the ambulance were opened and her stretcher was carried out by the paramedics. Heiji sank to the floor and let a few tears drop. He couldn't bear to lose her now that he had only just realised his feelings. Now he understood why Kudo was so protective of Ran. If she came out of this alive he would tell her and hope she felt the same way.

It was Ran's turn now. She had had cold water poured over her and she had woken up with a start to find the creepy man that she had seen at Tropical Land and had shot Kazuha pointing his gun at her. She glared balefully at him and sat up slowly, noting that she had a mark on her leg and that she was still handcuffed. She looked to the side of the man and saw her father handcuffed to a chair. Sitting opposite to him was the famous daughter of an actress that Ran had always admired. It was Sharon Vineyard. Standing near her was the news reader Rena Mizunashi who she had met. Ran couldn't get her head around it. Why were two celebrities working with murdering criminals that shot innocent teenagers and didn't show remorse? It didn't make sense. Nothing was making any sense to her anymore.

"Hello Mori-san," the man with silvery blonde hair said as politely as he could muster. He spat out his cigarette onto the floor which ruined the impression. "What do you know about Conan Edogawa?"

"He is a 7 year old boy that lives with me," she stated simply as well as trying to plan how to take him down.

"Why do you think he is so clever? Tell the truth or your father dies," Gin threatened, nodding to Kir who aimed her gun at Kogoro Mori. Vermouth looked on uninterestedly. Vodka had left the warehouse briefly to phone headquarter and tell them to research Conan Edogawa so Kir had to take over doing Gin's dirty work temporarily.

"Because he was taught be Shinichi Kudo. They are distantly related, I think."

"I've heard that name before. Kir?"

Kir spoke up. "He was a famous high school detective that was popular before he suddenly disappeared. I had been lined up to interview him. He is dead; according the records that the Organisation has on him. You killed him at the theme park Tropical Land by administering APTX 4869."

Ran felt a shiver travel down her spine. That day at Tropical Land. After solving that murder case Shinichi must have gotten into trouble poking his nose in something involving the men dressed in black. He was good at poking his nose into things, but it seemed like he had bitten off more that he could chew that time. Apparently the men in black had killed him, but that couldn't be right. She had seen him since and it had definitely been him and not a doppelganger. But he hadn't been acting exactly right. He asked for his name to be kept out of newspaper reports which seemed out of character at the time, but now it made sense; he was hiding from the Organisation. A few times Ran thought she saw smoke or steam emitting from him and he always did seem to be ill and had to leave quickly. She couldn't think of anything that would explain those points.

Ran stayed silent and tried hard to keep a poker face to stop the shock that she felt from slipping through and putting Shinichi, wherever he was, in danger. She prayed that her father would do the same to protect him.

Gin cast his mind back. Tropical Land. He remembered that smart ass detective that solved that murder case he had been a suspect in. He recalled forcing the pill down his throat and leaving him to die. He had enjoyed it, but he wished he could have seen the life leave his eyes. That was the best part of killing people.

"I remember him. Yes, he is definitely dead. No one survives APTX 4869. It explains why this Conan is so smart, but it doesn't explain how he knows about the Organisation," Gin said, trying to work out the connection. The boy must have heard from somewhere else. "A minute after he found out about us Shinichi Kudo was silenced so it can't be him."

Ran hoped that Conan was safe and wasn't at Hakase's house like he always seemed to be recently; it would be the first place that anyone would come looking for him. He had to stay hidden. She couldn't bear for him to be killed and she didn't want Shinichi to be killed either despite that the man had said that he was dead. She didn't understand how he could be dead. The only possibility that she would think of was that the poison somehow shrank him and he was now hiding as a little boy named Conan Edogawa.

Vodka interrupted Gin's musings by running back into the warehouse with his phone in his hand. He ran up to Gin, whispered something in his ear and passed his phone to him. Gin scrolled down that page and smiled in satisfaction. It wasn't a nice smile and it sent more shivers down Ran's spine. Gin felt like his dream was finally coming true. He would be Anokata's favourite now.

"Vermouth, you have been busy," he congratulated triumphantly throwing the phone at her. "The photos were taken by Bourbon and sent to that person."

Vermouth caught the phone neatly with a raised eyebrow expecting it to be something trivial that she had done ages ago. Nothing could have could prepared her for what she saw. The blood from her face faded at the sight of the photos. There first photo was of her incapacitating the wanted fugitive Aoko Nakamori outside 2-22 Beika, the next was of her holding a pill of APTX 4869 and the last was of a shrunken Aoko Nakamori lying on the ground. Vermouth gripped the phone in fear. She had made her biggest slip up; she had been seen and there was photographic evidence. Anokata was probably fuming and her career with the Organisation was over however you looked at it. They knew.


	15. Immortality

**Secrets and Lies: Chapter 15**

Anokata read the email that Bourbon had sent him unemotionally and then viewed the attachments which were all photos taken one after the other in a sequence. The photos showed that the previous Anokata's favourite was no longer loyal to the Organisation and needed to be stopped before she did anything else that would give them away. Her betrayal sparked only hate from him; he should have listened to what everyone had been telling him for the month that he had been the head of the Organisation. Most agents said that Vermouth couldn't be trusted anymore. She had been a loose cannon waiting to fire like Sherry and there would be no more of those.

The photos revealed an interesting side affect of APTX 4869 that he hadn't been made aware of before. As far as he knew the research had being a failure in terms of prolonging life which had been the target and had only produced a useful and untraceable poison. Maybe Sherry had had her uses after all. He would have to change her wanted status to wanted alive rather than dead so she could continue the research. That was if she was still alive.

What he had to do now was to decide what to do with Vermouth. The previous Anokata had died a month ago in suspicious circumstances and he had taken up the position in secret. If all the members of the Organisation knew that their head had been replaced by someone much younger they might not be so loyal. Only the highest ranking members knew which included Vermouth. He suspected that she wasn't loyal to only to the Organisation anymore and had had something to do with the previous Anokata's death, but he couldn't prove anything.

He was about to issue the order when his computer beeped indicating that he had a new email in his inbox. He clicked on it. Apparently progress had been made at the warehouse with interrogation of Kogoro Mori. It had been discovered that someone else had been solving the detective's cases for him. It was a 7 year old boy called Conan Edogawa that had a connection to Shinichi Kudo the high school detective that had been killed by the Organisation last year. Vodka was requesting more information and they had got all they could out of the detective and his daughter. Interesting.

A theory came to him that connected up APTX 4869, Shinichi Kudo and how the 7 year old Conan Edogawa knew about the Organisation. He had met Conan Edogawa a few times and was aware that he was very clever. Too clever for a 7 year old.

Anokata opened up on his computer the Organisation's extensive database if all its targets, members, locations and code words. He searched Conan Edogawa and came up with his file. He opened another window and typed in Shinichi Kudo and found his file which listed his status as deceased. He compared the photos of each person and smiled. His deduction had been correct. Conan Edogawa looked like a younger version of Shinichi Kudo which was of course what he really was.

He attached the photos that Bourbon had sent him as well as the two that he had just found to a text and sent it to all the members of the Organisation that were at the warehouse promising a big reward to whoever killed Vermouth first and to who found Conan Edogawa and brought him to headquarters. Vermouth had to go; she was an unwanted vestige of the past. He would change and update the Organisation.

* * *

 

"Oh, you have found me out then? Vermouth said standing up from her chair and stretching her arms out. As she moved her arms she turned to block Gin's view of what she was really doing. She retrieved her concealed spare gun and flicked the safety off. She turned back again to face him with her gun hidden behind her back. It was a shame that it had come to this. She had hoped that her Silver Bullet would arrive before any deaths occurred. Gin watched her movements carefully; he was well acquainted with her tricks.

"Your time at the top is over now. Anokata says that the first person that kills you will be promoted as well as the person that kidnaps Conan Edogawa," Gin gloated, his dream of silencing Vermouth was about to come true. "You've blown it now Vermouth."

She shot him an uncaring look, determined to undermine him until the end, "You'll be doing me a favour them. I've wanted out of the Organisation that I helped create for years. Even killing that person didn't do anything. Someone else took his place. You haven't noticed, have you? This Anokata is different."

Gin forced a smile, not sure whether to believe her or not. Even he had to admit that she was a good actress. It was probably another one of her mind games. "You're bluffing Vermouth. Give it up. You are going to die." He raised his gun and pointed it squarely at her chest. "I've been waiting for that sardonic smile of yours to fade from your face for a long time."

"You're not trusted enough to be told; only the top people know. I pity you."

"Stop lying. You've never pitied anyone in your life. Any famous last words you would care to say?"

Vermouth tightened her mouth and brought up her gun to fire at him. Gin had been expecting her to do something like that and he fired too. They both shot simultaneously. For a few seconds no one in the warehouse could work out who had been hit. Then a second later Gin dropped to the ground with a shot wound that resembled a poppy on his chest. Ten seconds later Vermouth staggered and fell too. Completely disregarding procedure and forgetting about the prisoners Kir and Vodka rushed over to check whether or not their superiors were dead. Chardonnay also hurried in having heard the shots.

Gin was clearly dead as Vermouth's shot had hit him exactly in the heart. Vermouth was still breathing, but her breaths were faint and her blood was rapidly pooling around her. Gin's shot had hit her ribcage and punctured her lung.

Ran watched as all the Black Organisation members gathered around two bodies with their backs unguarded. She judged that it was the perfect opportunity to strike. She slowly stood up, making sure that the rattling of her handcuffs wouldn't give her away. She decided on which Karate strike she should use and who subdue first. Rena Mizunashi had her gun drawn from earlier, but it was at her side. She was one the closest to Ran so she decided to take her out first.

However Ran didn't get to do any fighting as there was a sudden blinding flash that filled the warehouse with bright light. She screwed up her eyes as a familiar female voice yelled, "FBI, freeze!"

Everyone in the warehouse froze, stunned and blinded by the light. When Ran's eyes eventually recovered she saw her old English teacher armed with a gun that was pointed and all the people in black that were gathered at the back. Kaitou Kid was standing next to her throwing a grenade up in the air and catching it. Behind them was a group of foreigners that were also armed. She thought that she could see Conan at the back, but she wasn't sure.

Jodie walked forward cautiously backed up by two other agents. "All of you, put your hands up," she ordered and gave Ran a wink as she walked past. "Open your mouths and stick out your tongues," she added as an afterthought remembering that most criminal organisations make their agents hide cyanide in their mouth so when they are caught they can commit suicide so they don't leak any sensitive information.

Conan followed her at a distance and saw that the Black Organisation members were being handcuffed and Kuroba was picking the lock on Ran's handcuffs. He glimpsed Gin's corpse on the floor and saw that Vermouth was still alive. He came to the conclusion that she had shot Gin and got shot herself by someone else. He walked over to Ran and Kaito.

"Ran-neechan, are you all right?" he asked concernedly leaning forward to get a closer look.

Ran stretched her arms and legs to get rid of her cramp. There was a mark on her leg from where the stun gun got her, otherwise she was unharmed. She was more concerned about her father's injuries as there was blood around his mouth.

"I'm all right. Can you get Otou-san's handcuffs off as well?" she requested Kid who dutifully went off to give them some privacy.

"Listen Ran, I have something to tell you," he started, about to tell her everything about him and the Black Organisation. She needed to know so she would be in less danger.

He was just getting started when Jodie interrupted him brusquely. She had been unsympathetically checking Vermouth's injuries and she suspected that the woman was faking it. Then she had realised that Vermouth was really dying and didn't have long left. "Cool kid, over here. Vermouth wants to tell you something."

Vermouth didn't look good. Her eyes kept closing and she had to fight to keep them open and her blood was rapidly flowing into a pool around her on the floor.

Jodie whispered in Conan's ear to prepare him. "An ambulance wouldn't get here in time if we called one. We still need to get answers out of her before she dies. It's up to you."

He nodded and crouched down by Vermouth's head trying to avoid falling in the pool of blood. Vermouth smiled faintly at him and began to speak rapidly. She was very much aware that she was on her deathbed and didn't feel any regret. At least she would look young and pretty when she was dead. She had lived far too long already and had cheated death a few times.

"A long time ago I and a man created an organisation that we hoped would change the world for the better as we felt that the current rulers weren't doing enough. However that man was lured by greed and riches around 50 years ago and the organisation became a secret band of criminals that did crime for money. I remained loyal to him because I loved him and we both drank a certain substance that prolonged our lives. I changed my mind about everything when I met you. I realised that we had lost our way and something needed to be done. You have become the Silver Bullet that will destroy us. Last month I murdered Him thinking that I would become Anokata and be able to change everything. Unfortunately someone else got the position and I was shut out. You have to be careful. You know this person." Her voice became fainter and scratchier.

Conan had many questions for her, but he could see that she was nearly gone. He settled for the most important question. "Who is Anokata now?"

Vermouth sighed faintly; she had very little strength left. She grabbed his sleeve and pulled him closer with her last ounce of strength so she could speak in his ear. Her voice was barely audible. "It's..."

Her hand dropped and her breathing. Her chest was no longer moving up and down. Vermouth was finally dead. Conan stood up and pondered her words. What was the substance that she drank? It couldn't be APTX 4869 because it didn't work on adults and it wouldn't have been around. Was it in Pandora's tears? Who was Anokata before? Who was Anokata now? He hoped that he would be able to answer those questions himself soon. He had to plan a new way of confronting the Black Organisation and fast before they kidnapped anyone else close to him.

He left Vermouth to Jodie and walked over to Ran who was being entertained with magic tricks by Kuroba who was still dressed as Kaito Kid. He had to admire Kuroba's techniques with charming people; all he had to do to put them at ease was to pull a rose out of his sleeve. Aoko Nakamori was a very lucky girl.

The surviving members of the Black Organisation had been handcuffed and escorted into the van that had just arrived. The cyanide had been removed from their mouths to stop them from committing suicide. The question of what to do with Kir would have to wait.

To get out of the traffic jam Jodie and Conan had walked to the front to see what the blockage that was holding everything up was. It turned out to be a police roadblock. There had been a murder and the police were only letting one car go through their roadblock at a time and the traffic had completely slowed due to this. Luckily Takagi and Sato had been present and had asked Conan's help in solving the case. It hadn't been a hard case; there was only one victim and three suspects. Once the murderer had been arrested the Police had lifted the roadblock and Jodie and Conan had run back to her car. They had arrived at the warehouse in time to hear the shots. Kaito had kept Conan posted on what was going on, but he hadn't had a chance to explain what happened in the last five minutes.

Kaito noticed Conan and realised that he was probably going to confess to Ran and tell her the truth so she said good bye to her and made himself scarce after checking the colour of her underwear.

Conan took off his glasses. "Ran, I've been lying to you. I'm really Shinichi Kudo."


	16. Attack

**Secrets and Lies: Chapter 16**

Ran smiled to herself. Her suspicions had been correct. He was finally going to tell her the truth about himself. Maybe he would add to the confession that he had made in London.

"I know you are," Ran said smiling at him to show that she wasn't surprised. "You're not very subtle sometimes and I have suspected you, but I thought it was impossible up until now. I can see why you haven't told me the truth."

"I didn't want to endanger your life. If people came after me you would be the first person they would ask so I didn't want to burden you by asking you to lie. Only a few people know about it."

Conan had always secretly dreaded telling Ran the truth because he was afraid that she would cry and feel betrayed that he had been lying to her all along. She was taking it better than he expected.

Ran could guess a few of the people that knew. "Hattori-kun , I guess? He calls you Kudo sometimes and tries to cover it up. I never guessed that Jodie-sensei was an FBI agent though. She seemed too... ditsy."

"The Organisation was what she was investigating," Conan explained taking her hand and leading her away from the corpses on the floor. "The woman named Vermouth killed her father and ruined her childhood. She has always wanted revenge. I suppose she had got it now."

He cast a look back at Jodie who was picking up the weapons that had been dropped by Gin and Vermouth. He thought he saw a tear snake down her cheek. He decided that it would be best if he left her alone for now.

Ran followed his glance and understood. "Can you explain everything to me now? I can guess some of what happened at Tropical Land that night."

"Not yet. I still have to find out who Anokata is and finish destroying Them," Conan answered sadly wondering how long it would take now that he had made a little progress. He had lost his two most important informers and he no longer had any allies in the Black Organisation.

Jodie wiped her face with her sleeve and picked up Vodka's phone that had been lying under Vermouth. She unlocked it and saw the photos and the message that went with it. She recognised where they were taken, then the significance of what happened to the girl in the photos hit her like a bolt of lightning. She gasped in surprise and shot a quick glance at Conan's retreating back. She knew who he was now. She smiled to herself and made a mental note to question him properly when she next had the chance. She read the message again and her heart jumped. Cool Kid must be hiding Kaito Kuroba, Aoko Nakamori and Saguru Hakuba at Professor Agasa's house which was where the photos had been taken. That meant the Organisation knew where they were hiding and could be on their way right now. In fact They could have been there and killed all of them by now.

She waved the phone at the nearest person which was Kaito who had taken off his suit jacket and top hat.

"I know who Cool Kid is now, but that doesn't matter now," Jodie informed him and showed him the phone. "We have to warn them. I'll go tell Cool Kid."

Kaito looked at the photos and the significance wasn't lost on him and his heart lurched into overdrive. If they had been taken outside 2-22 Beika someone from the Black Organisation that wasn't Vermouth must know that they were hiding there. He had to get everyone out of there immediately. If Haibara died there wouldn't be an antidote. If Hakuba died he would miss the arguments. If Aoko died he didn't know what he would do...

Haibara emerged from the basement wincing at her sudden exposure to light. She had finally finished making a prototype antidote and was looking for a prospective test subject. She had been planning to ask Kudo-kun as he always seemed to want one, but the only person she could see in the front room was the snobby blonde detective Hakuba. He was sitting in an armchair reading a Sherlock Holmes omnibus that he had found lying around. It was early evening and the sun had just set.

"Where is everyone?" Haibara enquired spotting Hakase working on an invention in the corner.

"There has been a sudden development. Kogoro Mori and Ran Mori were kidnapped earlier. Kudo-kun sent Kuroba to follow them using his hang glider and he went off with the FBI. I haven't heard anything from either of them. Nakamori-san is in the kitchen making something for her boyfriend."

Haibara nodded and headed off to the kitchen becoming aware how long it had been since she had last eaten. She had a craving for a peanut butter and blueberry jam. When she entered she found Aoko making a chocolate fudge ice cream sundae. Aoko offered to make the sandwich for her, but Haibara refused as she wanted to keep the place where she hid the peanut butter and blueberry jam secret.

The doorbell rang and Hakase went to see who the visitors were. After seeing who they were he let them in immediately. It was Yusaku and Yukiko Kudo. He introduced Hakuba to them and called Aoko and Haibara out to meet them.

"We just arrived from the airport. Our son gave us an explanation on why he needed us and warned us the there was a possible member of the Black Organisation staying in our house," Yusaku explained sitting down and accepting a cup of tea from Aoko. "So we weren't surprised to see him and we were armed just in case of anything. What we didn't expect was for him to be dressed in Kevlar and be carrying a machine gun. It seems he was just on his way here to kill all of you. Luckily I knocked him out and he is currently incapacitated."

"There's a member of the Black Organisation living next door. Kudo-kun didn't tell us," Aoko said angrily.

"There is. He probably didn't tell any of you for a reason. Nakamori-san there were several pictures of you on his computer that he left switched on. It seems he sent them to someone. You all need to get out of here right now."

"Now?"

"Yes. It's for your own good. There could be people on the way here already."

Haibara and Aoko nodded. Haibara rushed to the basement to retrieve her research and prototype antidote. Aoko grabbed her shoes and was ready to leave when the front door was blown apart and smoke began to seep into the front room and she had the ominous feeling that someone was waiting outside with a gun that was fully prepared to kill everyone. She screamed loudly to alert everyone else in case they hadn't heard the bang, grabbed Ai who had just come out the basement clutching a case of pills as well as a memory stick and ran to the kitchen to where Hakase, Hakuba and the Kudos were waiting. They had opened the back door and gestured at them to run first. There was no time to lose. The danger was imminent.

Hakuba pushed Aoko and Ai out the door first in the rule that he had been taught "Women and children first," and looked at Yukiko. She shook her head.

"You go first," she replied drawing a pistol from her designer leather handbag that she had been carrying. "Yusaku and I will buy you some time. You can run next door for now and we'll arrange a safe place later."

Aoko and Hakuba nodded, not liking the idea, but as they could hear yells coming from the front room and the kitchen was slowly filling with grey smoke, they knew that now was not the time to argue. Ai frowned.

"What about you Hakase?"

Hakase avoided her gaze and handed Aoko something small and light wrapped in newspaper. "I made a gadget for you. It was only a quick job, but it will do. Hurry."

Hakuba got the message and took Ai's hand and pulled her along with them as they ran across the back garden trying to block out the noise of shots being fired that was coming from Hakase's house. When they reached the wall that separated the Kudo and Agasa residences Hakuba's mobile phone began to ring. He looked at the caller ID and saw that it was Kaito. He accepted the call and put it on speaker so he could hear what Kaito was saying as he gave Aoko and Ai a leg up so they could climb over the wall.

"I really can't talk right now Kuroba."

As if to validate his sentence there was a loud explosion from the Agasa house and picked up the phone and scaled the wall himself whilst listening to Kaito.

"I called to warn you that there is a hit team on the way. I take it that you are already aware? Is Aoko safe?"

"Old news Kuroba," Hakuba said dropping off the wall as gracefully as he could whilst gripping a phone in one hand. He threw the phone to Aoko to let her confirm her safety herself whilst he decided what to do next.

Ai looked shaken like she had been a victim of a bombing and was clenching onto the case of pills and memory stick tightly. She had finished the antidote, but she might not live to give it Kudo and he might not live either to take it. She had to know whether it worked or not. She glanced over at Aoko who was talking on the phone worriedly to Kaito.

As Aoko hung up the phone after telling Kaito their location and listening to what had happened at the warehouse they all became aware that the sound of gunfire had ceased. They waited for minute to listen for further sounds of fighting and death. Aoko yelped when Yukiko dropped down onto the ground next to her. Her neat hair and curls were now in disarray and her face was blackened with smoke.

"Yusaku and Hakase are behind me," she explained straightening up and loading a clip of bullets into her gun. "Yusaku was shot in the arm and Hakase is fine." She looked around her. "We need to keep moving. I agreed to meet Yusaku at our house."

Inside the Kudo residence the group found Subaru Okiya tied to a chair in the library. He was now conscious and frantically trying to undo the rope. He ignored their entry into the room and Yukiko knocked him out again with her taser and made sure the gag and knots were still tight. Yusaku and Hakase entered the room coughing and wincing. Both were breathing hard and also had blackened faces and Yusaku was trying to stem the flow of blood from his shot wound with his arm. Yukiko grabbed his arm and tied a handkerchief around it.

"We can't stay here for long. It's only a matter of time before reinforcements arrive," Yusaku said looking fondly around his precious library for what could be the last time. If they ever returned to this house they would probably find it blown to pieces.

"I think we should," Hakuba agreed. "Kuroba told me that They are after Kudo and They know the effect of using of APTX 4869 on younger people. It is only going to take them a few seconds to work out who he really is."

"But where will we go?" Aoko asked concernedly. Kaito's mother had been attacked and the Kuroba house was probably been watched in case they went there, her house had been set on fire and Hakuba's house wasn't safe for obvious reasons.

Yusaku considered the options. "I think we should disguise ourselves and stay in a hotel. You can pretend to be our children. Nakamori-san and Haibara-san can be twins. Yukiko, go grab your disguise kit and a spare change of clothes for both of us and hurry."

After Yukiko ran off Hakuba asked what they were going to do with Okiya as they couldn't take him with them.

"We'll leave him here for the FBI unless his colleagues get here first."

"I've finished the antidote," Ai announced as they were leaving the house after they had all hastily put on wigs and make up. "It should be permanent. I was going to offer it to Nakamori-san and Kudo-kun as They are looking out for them as children."


	17. Lockets and Watches

**Secrets and Lies: Chapter 17**

The staff at the Haido City Hotel weren't quite sure what to think about the Midori family. That afternoon the dark haired parents, their brown haired teenage son who was wearing a blue suit and their daughters had arrived looking very rushed and they all kept looking around them suspiciously at the women kept patting her handbag for some reason. They had booked the largest and most expensive suite in the hotel and had paid up front with a large amount of cash that the husband had produced from his pocket. The husband had also seemed a little strained in his manner and he had been holding his arm for most of the time.

They had also paid the staff extra to deny that they were staying there if they were asked about a large family that had checked into the hotel that day.

What had cemented the impression of the Midori family was that a few hours after they had arrived and settled in a teenage boy dressed in a white suit with a blue shirt underneath that was a little worse for wear had come running into the reception asking if he could see a family with 2 little girls that had checked in a few hours ago. With the orders fresh in their mind the staff at the front desk had denied that there was such a family staying in the hotel. The mysterious boy wouldn't take no for an answer and then a younger boy with black hair and glasses had pulled him by the arm up the stairs.

"Kuroba, I told you to wait for me to ring them for their room number," Conan reprimanded Kaito as they walked up a flight of stairs. "It's Room 2408 and it's on the top floor. I think we'll take the lift instead of walking. It's a long way to go by stairs."

"Sorry," Kaito apologised brushing his suit and trying to pick particles of dirt off. "I can't wait to see Aoko, that's all."

"Don't worry. I can't wait to see Haibara either." Conan caught Kaito's glance and realised what it had sounded like. "She has got an antidote prepared."

The FBI had cleared out the warehouse an hour ago and Kaito had only just got back into Tokyo. The surviving members of the Black Organisation Kir, Vodka and Chardonnay had been arrested and taken to the police station. It would have looked suspicious if Kir hadn't been arrested and Vermouth and Gin's bodies had been taken to the mortuary. Conan hoped that it wouldn't disappear on the way like Snake's had, but he knew it probably would never arrive as it probably held too many secrets. He had formulated a new plan for drawing out the Black Organisation and needed to run it past everyone.

Heiji Hattori had rung to say that Kazuha had come out of surgery and seemed to be fine, but he didn't want to leave her bedside in case she woke up. He had promised to be there if there was a big showdown and was disappointed to hear that he had missed out on some action. However he was glad that Gin had died; he had started off the entire mess by administering Kudo with the APTX 4869 in the first place. If it wasn't for him Kudo would still be a big headed teenage detective and Kazuha would be unharmed, but would be ignorant of his true feelings for her. Maybe Gin had done some good.

Aoko flung her arms around Kaito's neck without needing to stretch as soon as he set foot in the hotel suit. He was so tired that it took him a few seconds longer than it should have to notice that she hadn't needed to stand on tiptoes and that she was back to her normal teenage size.

He held her out at arm's length to make sure that he wasn't being driven insane by fatigue and worry. He blinked a few times and then pulled her into a tight hug and buried his face in her damp hair. He had missed her. She looked up at him.

"Welcome back Kaito," she greeted kissing him lightly on the lips. Kaito groaned and deepened the kiss.

Conan who had entered the suite behind Kaito coughed loudly to point out that they were being a little loud, but he couldn't really blame Kaito for grabbing small moments with the person that he loved whilst they were both still alive. Kaito and Aoko had been through a lot in the past few days and both harboured a concern that the other wasn't going to live. Considering what had happened to Kazuha they had a point.

He walked past the kissing couple and over to Haibara who was perched on a single bed in the corner reading a science magazine. His eyes surveyed the bedroom of the suite. The door to the adjoining room was open and he could see his mother's back and could hear Hakuba's voice.

"So the antidote works then?"

Ai looked up without smiling. "It seems to have been stable for the past few hours and I hope it really is the permanent one," she answered seriously, looking over at Aoko. "I copied as much data as I could before we ran onto a memory stick so if it doesn't work I don't have to start from scratch. However I'm hoping that this is the one."

"Uh, was that your only pill?" Conan enquired casually, or he hoped he sounded casual.

Ai wasn't fooled. "I have 2 others. I suggest you consult everyone else before you take it though."

Kaito and Aoko drew apart as they caught their breath.

"Nice pyjamas," Kaito quipped enjoying the sight of Aoko in hotel issue pyjamas that were several sizes too big for her and damp hair.

"We're kind of low on adult size clothes here," Aoko smiled at him. "Have you heard about anything else that happened at 2-22 Beika? Agasa-Hakase stayed behind to guard Okiya so the FBI could take him into custody."

"Really? We haven't heard anything from the FBI since we split to get here."

Aoko frowned and then she brightened as she remembered the gadgets that Hakase had made for her. ""Agasa-Hakase made me something so that we can keep track of each other," she walked over to her bedside table and unwrapped the newspaper that wrapped it. She held up a silver locket on a chain. "This one is for me."

She threw a slim metal disc at him that was about the size of his watch face.

"What's this?"

"Since he didn't have time to say much I don't know, but I assume it's to go on the back of your watch. My locket can track your watch and vice versa. There's also a small communicator in both of them and they're both on the same frequency so we can communicate with each other," Aoko explained clasping the necklace around her neck. "I think he has made something similar for Kudo-kun."

Kaito took off his watch and pressed to the disc onto the back. It stuck to the back immediately. As he was putting his watch back on his stomach rumbled. He looked at Aoko apologetically.

"Sorry. I haven't eaten anything since the rice crackers this afternoon and I have burnt a lot of calories."

"None of us have eaten yet. I think we're forbidden from calling room service so I'll go ask the adults about what we're going to do for food."

An hour later the three Kudos, Kaito, Aoko, Hakuba and Ai were gathered around a table of convenience store bentos and rice balls in their hotel suite. Conan was just ending a phone call with Jodie Starling.

"Don't worry. I'm formulating a plan at the moment. Bye." He snapped his phone shut and picked up his chopsticks.

"Gin and Vermouth's corpses disappeared en route to the mortuary," he informed everyone through a mouthful of rice. "There is definitely a Black Organisation member of informer in the 1st Division. Luckily Kir and the others are staying with the FBI for now.

"Who in the Police were informed about the incident at the warehouse and the dead bodies?" Yusaku asked.

"Megure-Keibu's team; Sato, Takagi, Shiratori and Chiba. The Black Organisation is closer to me than I thought. Of course any of them could have let it slip to another Police Officer and we could have been followed from the warehouse, but they were instructed to keep it quiet and I don't think that the Black Organisation knew anything was amiss until a little later. "

"I don't think that Megure is Black Organisation. He is an old friend. Then again most peoples' allegiances can be turned by the right stimulus," Yusaku interjected.

"True, but I told Jodie Starling only to inform a few people in the Police so I could narrow down the suspects. It worked."

"You're that devious?" Hakuba raised his eyebrows. "I can't say much. I'm the son of a member of the Black Organisation after all."

"Only slightly. As for ideas for the identity of Anokata, I'm stumped. Vermouth told me that the current one was new and the old one was dead. She also said that I knew the person. It could be anyone."

"I think we're going to be asking Rena Mizunashi a lot of questions, but since not even Gin knew about the change she isn't likely to know much."

"How's Ran-chan and Mouri-san?" Yukiko enquired. "You said the FBI kept them for questioning and that Ran-chan knows the truth now."

"Jodie said they were asleep and she also knows who I am. It's all coming out now," Conan said wryly.

"It is," Yusaku agreed. "We need to hit the Black Organisation now when they're still reeling from the sudden loss of some of their best agents. I have an idea, but it needs some work. I wanted to discuss it with everyone to get their feedback."

"Who's going to be bait?" Ai asked shrewdly, beginning to get a bad feeling. "It's not me is it?"

"It's Hakuba-kun."

* * *

 

Anokata knew that he had been manipulated. After an hour of no contact from the warehouse he knew there was something going on. Then a short while after a call from the FBI agent Jodie Starling who was known to the Organisation had called the 1st Division to inform them that Kogoro Mori and Ran Mori had been attacked by a known criminal gang and she and some other agents had rescued them from a warehouse on the outskirts of Tokyo, but there had been a few casualties and the bodies of 2 members of the gang were on the way to mortuary.

He had immediately ordered the bodies to be intercepted and disposed of. He was glad one of them was Vermouth and wasn't too saddened by the death of Gin; the man was too sadistic for his own good.

Anokata had only found out later that only a few people had been informed about the attack and he knew he had been tricked into forcing his hand. He had to get to the root of the problem know before the FBI did anything else. He considered the main root of the problem to be Conan Edogawa, Saguru Hakuba, Kaito Kuroba, Kaito Kid and Aoko Nakamori after he had heard about the failed attack on 2-22 Beika and he inferred that Okiya who had proved to be the be a useful agent had also been taken by the FBI.


	18. Background Research

**Secrets and Lies: Chapter 18**

Okiya glared balefully at his captors with visible hatred from the chair that he was handcuffed to. He had finally been given the order to attack the residents of the house next door to his current residence which would have lead to his promotion in the ranks of the Organisation. Unfortunately everything had gone downhill from there when the Kudos had burst in on him and knocked him out.

Nothing of interest had really occurred since had had moved to 2-21 Beika aside from being mixed up in a few murder cases and scaring a certain little girl until a night ago when he had glimpsed a shadowy figure walk past his house through his bedroom window. Upon closer inspection he had realised that it was Vermouth. He had run downstairs and out the front door carrying a camera with a telephoto lens; the only long viewing instrument he could get his hands on at such short notice. Besides he might need to take photos of what Vermouth was doing as he hadn't heard anything about Vermouth going after Sherry.

He had darted across the street making sure that Vermouth wouldn't spot him and hid in a neighbour's garden. He had only started snapping photos from his covert hiding place when a young girl who he recognised as being Aoko Nakamori, who was wanted by the Organisation, emerged from the gate of 2-22 Beika. As she walked towards the dustbin she was skilfully knocked unconscious by Vermouth. Next Vermouth had forced a pill that resembled APTX 4869 down the girl's throat and he had watched as her body began to shake and shrink. When it had stopped Vermouth had disappeared down the street. He had left the scene after the boy Conan Edogawa and 2 other teenagers that he realised were Kaito Kuroba and Saguru Hakuba had come running.

That night he had debated what to do. He now had definite proof that the little girl that resembled Sherry that lived next door and went by the name Ai Haibara was definitely the escaped scientist Sherry and that Vermouth's loyalties were no longer with the Organisation. The biggest coup was that fact that the 3 fugitives that were wanted by the Organisation were hiding in the house next to him. If he reported everything to Anokata now, he would be rewarded immensely, but he had to play his cards right or someone else like Gin would steal all the glory. He made his mind up. He would wait until new orders were issued the next day.

Then something in his mind made him think of Conan Edogawa and Shinichi Kudo. He knew the real owner of the house he was living in was Shinichi Kudo who was currently listed as being dead by the Organisation, but the girl with long black hair that had mistaken him for a burglar seemed to be in contact with the teenage detective or at least someone that took care of his matters. A lot of things about the case of Shinichi Kudo didn't add up and neither did Conan Edogawa. The boy was too smart for his age. It would make sense if he was the same person as Shinichi Kudo and had been shrunk by APTX 4869. Okiya thought it would be better to decide what to do the next day rather than worry about it now.

Now, sitting handcuffed in the basement of an FBI safe house and bearing scars from several attacks with a taser he wished he had sent the email the night before. If he had done it there and then he wouldn't be in his current predicament.

* * *

 

The secretary of Chief Hakuba knocked quietly on her employer's door. He had told her that he was not to be disturbed, but it was important. After receiving a gruff reply to enter she walked into his office to find him deep in conversation with a police officer that she recognised from the 1st Division.

"I'm sorry for interrupting," she apologised. "But your son called and since I told him you didn't want to be disturbed he left a message."

"What?" he exclaimed. "Give it here." He held out his hand and he had a strange expression on his face whilst the other police officer watched with an amused look on his face.

She placed the memo that she had copied the message onto into his outstretched hand and took the opportunity to leave the room. She knew he hated being interrupted and wasn't very fond of his son.

Chief Hakuba read the message with a raised eyebrow and passed it to the man sitting in front of him.

**Father,**

**I'm in trouble. I need your help. I will be at the house at 8 o'clock this evening to explain everything to you. I hope you will help.**

**Saguru.**

"It's a trap," the man stated simply. "A very obvious one at that. They know that you are in the Organisation and they want to add to their collection of arrested agents."

"Who have they got now?"

"Gin and Vermouth are dead," the man began.

"Good," Chief Hakuba interrupted. "Sorry."

The man glared at him for interrupting and continued. "Kir, Vodka and Chardonnay were captured at the warehouse and were taken by the FBI which wasn't reported to the Police. No one ever tells the Police anything. Later on in the day Bourbon was captured too and the agents that stormed 2-22 Beika to find Shinichi Kudo were killed when the house caught alight."

"So we're in a big mess at the moment," Chief Hakuba concluded. "As Anokata, what are you going to do? If this continues at the current rate the Organisation will no longer exist. You have only just taken over recently and you need to prove your worth."

"I am going to get to the root of the problem. Shinichi Kudo/ Conan Edogawa, Kaito Kuroba, who by the way is Kaito Kid, Sherry who currently goes under the name of Ai Haibara and is 7 years old, your son and Aoko Nakamori."

The night before Anokata had pulled an all-nighter researching. He had known that he desperately needed to know more about the fugitives in order to know how to track them down and capture them. Finding out Kid's true identity had been easy. You didn't have to look very hard to find out that Kaito Kuroba was Kaito Kid. Everyone in the Organisation knew that this was a new Kaito Kid and the previous one had been Toichi Kuroba. The heists had started again when Kaito Kuroba had hit 16 and was old enough to know who his father had been. It therefore followed that he had picked up where his father had left off. He was the most likely person to be the new Kid as he was the closest magician to Toichi Kuroba and had a good reason to continue the heists. Anokata couldn't understand why the previous Anokata and Snake for that matter hadn't carried out basic research into the Kuroba family. It was infuriating to think that the previous Anokata hadn't been capable to do that or hire any decent agents.

As for Sherry, he had looked carefully at the report of her escape. The handcuffs that she had been restrained with were undamaged as if she had been able to just slip her hand out. More importantly there had been a rubbish chute in the room she had been confined in- just big enough to fit a child. If you factored the effect of APTX 4869 into the equation it was glaringly obvious as to how she had escaped.

Anokata had also met the little girl Ai Haibara on a few occasions and had noted that she resembled Sherry, but he hadn't really paid much attention to her. Now he knew why there had been something about her manner that bothered him. Now he knew.

"How would we get to them?" Hakuba enquired.

Anokata held up the message from Saguru Hakuba.

"They are planning to trap us so I think we should employ a bigger trap and trap all of them. Let's just say there will be as many agents as we can spare at your house this evening."

* * *

 

**8:00pm**

Hakuba pulled at his collar nervously and wiped a bead of sweat that had trickled down his face away. If someone had told him a year ago that he would put his life on the line to protect his worst enemy and a 17 year old that looked like 7 year old he would have politely suggested that they check into a mental asylum as they were evidently insane.

He took a deep breath and rang the doorbell to what used to be his home. Casually, he looked around him. The agents from the Black Organisation weren't doing a good job of hiding themselves he could see one of them barely concealed in a tree. It was as Yusaku Kudo had expected. That man was wasted as an author.

After a few seconds the door was unlocked and pulled open by Chief Hakuba who was dressed formally in a suit.

"Hello Father," he greeted politely as if he had just come home from school.

"Are you alone?" Chief Hakuba asked brusquely.

"Yes."

Chief Hakuba surveyed his garden carefully and smiled.

"Of course. Come on in. I believe you wanted my help." He turned and Hakuba followed him down the dark hallway.

They both entered the front room and Chief Hakuba sat himself down in his preferred armchair and helped himself from a decanter of sherry.

"If you could just wait a few minutes, I'm expecting some visitors. Help yourself to a drink if you like," he said and left the room.

As soon as he left Hakuba let out the breath that he had been holding. So far so good. He patted the gun in his pocket. He shuffled his position on the sofa and listened deeply to the sound of the front door opening and the faint muffle of voices.

The door was thrown open and Agent Camel, Conan and Jodie Starling were pushed into the room by his father and another agent at gunpoint. The agent was sporting a fresh nosebleed and had a cut on his face.

"Nice try, son," Chief Hakuba congratulated sarcastically. "They weren't hidden very well at all."

He switched his attention to Conan. "We've all been looking for you Shinichi Kudo. We have a lot of questions to ask you and a proposition to put to you. Anokata is very eager to meet you."

He let a sardonic laugh as he watched fear dilate the boy's pupils. "The rest of you are just baggage to be disposed of later."

"What are you going to do with me?" Hakuba asked with a raised eyebrow.

Chief Hakuba laughed again. "You aren't going to get any special treatment just because you are my son. You can stay with the FBI agents and you can give me that gun in your pocket first."

With a cold expression Hakuba passed the gun over and allowed himself to be handcuffed and led off by the agent. Camel, Jodie and Hakuba were blindfolded before being locked in the wine cellar of the Hakuba residence. They weren't afraid. Everything had gone to plan.

Hakuba's mouth which was really Kaito's stretched into a smile. Kaito spat a paperclip out his mouth which fell into his lap and picked the lock of his handcuffs accurately. Due to his blindfold it took him a few more seconds than it normally did. He pulled off his Hakuba face mask and wig and stretched.

"Having hair like that is annoying. I really don't know how Hakuba copes. No wonder he has no sense of humour- he's blonde."

"Kuroba-kun," Jodie reminded him of where he was. "Please keep your voice down."

Conan Edogawa who was really the teen detective Shinichi Kudo was not what Chief Hakuba had expected at all. He was the size of a young child, but something about his eyes- a glint, showed that he wasn't your average 7 year old.

Those eyes were coolly gazing at him now. However the shadow of fear remained despite the fearless facade the boy was putting up. That made him admire the boy slightly more even in spite of the problems he had cause for the Organisation.

An agent passed him the contents of Shinichi Kudo's pocket. A spare pair of glasses, a mobile phone and house key. No obvious weapons.

"We also found a listening device on him and a tracker," the agent informed him in a businesslike tone. "I took the liberty of destroying those devices as well as his shoes and watch."

Chief Hakuba was unconcerned about the listening device as there was a jammer in the house that blocked the transmission on such devices in the house which came in useful in situations like this although his son had complained frequently about having to go out onto the street to make a call on his mobile phone, but that had never bothered him personally.

He consulted his watch. Anokata was due to arrive in a few minutes to talk to Shinichi Kudo and kill him and his allies. He didn't care that his son was about to die; he had chosen the wrong side to support and he had no sympathy for him.


End file.
